


Flashfreeze

by Leletha



Series: Nightfall [7]
Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Assorted Original Background Characters - Freeform, Body Language, Cross-Species Adoption, Dragonspeak, Feral Behavior, Feral Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Gen, Nightfall - Freeform, Platonic Soulmates, Raised by Animals, Side Story, Snow and Ice, Spoilers, Threeshot, a day in the life, runaways - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-22
Updated: 2016-08-05
Packaged: 2018-07-26 01:50:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 28,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7555450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leletha/pseuds/Leletha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A flight, a search, far too much ice, small dragons, and the Skrill… Or, a “Nightfall” threeshot for everyone who wondered what would happen when dragon-feral Hiccup and his Toothless crossed paths with Dagur the Deranged.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Island

**Author's Note:**

> A “Nightfall” AU story in three parts, set after the sequel “Stormfall”. As such, contains spoilers for “Stormfall”.

_one day I will write a “Nightfall” side story with a title that doesn’t begin with F. Next time, I promise…_

* * *

**_Flashfreeze,_ ** **Part One: The Island**

The cliff is very high, and the wind from the sea, carrying the scents of saltwater and the world beyond, is strong. It tears through the gorge in gusts, dipping and teasing and flirting, roaring fierce as thunder like a challenge and then falling almost still. When it breathes out again, it is a great gust that strikes against the end of the long gully far away in the heart of the island, and splashes up out of it like a wave, far above the sea.

Hiccup is undisturbed by heights. He has lived most of his life in the sky, on the edges of cliffs, and on the ledges and outcroppings and overhanging stones of the vast network of caves he considers his home. He scampers back and forth across the peak of the cliff over the sea, not careless of the sharp rocks falling away beneath him into the churning sea below, and not heedless; he is well aware of the danger, but he is unconcerned.

His attention is on the erratic winds and their promise of flight, and the lingering threat of yet _another_ crash.

The wind from the ocean screams a challenge to him where he waits on the edge of the stones, head raised to catch the scent of it and wings half-spread, ready to leap. The smallest of steps and the ground falls away, and then there will be flying.

His wings trail behind him as he moves, making _ssh ssh ssh_ sounds as the thin leather scrapes against rough stone, and if anything of his situation disturbs him, it is that his wings are not as strong as those of his constant companion Toothless. They are a thing he made when he could no longer wait for them to grow on their own to match the dragons that are his family, when the siren call of the open sky was stronger than his belief that he is no different from that family.

This is a good place for pretend-like gliding wings, though, and Hiccup sits back on his heels, listening and watching for the movements of the thin grasses and stubborn shrubs that cling hopefully to the jagged stones. It is a good game, to chase the wind and pounce just right to make it carry him.

At his back the high-cliffs island rolls away, the wide open windswept plains broken by the deep crevasses that tear through it, sheltering the loud birds that lived here first and scream often in indignation at the dragons that have come here to live. From the sky as he and Toothless first flew over they imagined that the island had cracked and fallen apart like a thick-shelled egg that had fractured instead of bursting, or that a dragon even bigger than their king had raised a paw and torn deep scars through the island. Water gushes from the crevasses like blood, the waves racing into their confines balked at last and limping back to the freedom of the open sea again.

That was before, though. Hiccup and Toothless do not laugh anymore at the thought of dragons big enough to challenge their king.

_Those_ scars cannot be seen.

But in the sky the wind races alongside the waves, chasing them up the broken-open crevasses quick and hunting, and it is a very good game to fly with it.

Beside him as he waits for the best wind to pounce on and catch and ride with, Toothless- _best-beloved-self_ lifts his head and his ear-flaps perk forward. His wings spread just a bit instinctively, and Hiccup grins in the way of dragons, eager to leap. Toothless trembles with excitement, ready to pounce, but hesitates, thrumming _waiting eager not-yet wait-to-pounce_ because that is how this game is played. It is a race, of a sort, and a dare, of a kind, and these things Toothless loves as fiercely as does his companion.

With the dragon he loves as his own heart at his side, the safety of knowing that there are others of their flock nearby, and a dare and a challenge and _flying_ to play at, tension singing through his spine and humming through all his limbs as he waits, Hiccup is as happy as he has ever been.

He is a very long way from the man he might have been, in another life. Instead he is the dragon he was raised as, the dragon he has chosen to be, utterly wild. Perhaps he is a little more. He is unusual, for a dragon. He is only half of a self – he and Toothless believe themselves a single being in two bodies, inseparable. He can do things that other dragons cannot; that is fair and the way of things, many of his cousins can do things that he cannot; not all dragons do things the same. He has clever paws and fur instead of the tail he still covets.

But he is _a dragon_ , and certainly no less.

Wild thing that he is, he would not crouch and sidle away in shame beneath the eyes of anyone, dragon or _pfikingr-_ human enemy or sometime human ally.

_Now!_ Toothless signals with a yelp as a hissing blast of sea wind howls into the gully beneath their paws, and Hiccup throws himself into the air without hesitation.

At once the gust catches his outspread wings, snatching at them. The dragon-feral twists in the air, turning and shifting to match the wind so that they soar together. His wings billow out with the breath of the wind and he spins, the walls of the gully tearing past as the open ocean falls away in his wake.

Hiccup whistles _delight_ even as the sound is whipped away.

A shadow falls across him for only a moment as Toothless darts past, soaring over him easily. Toothless’ wings are spread to glide too, matching his beloved-companion, but there is enough of the echo of his movements in his body that Hiccup knows that Toothless is cheating, beating his wings when he was not looking.

_Indignation you you you mock-outrage-only-playing flying us flying good flying yes!_ he yelps, the minor irritation – he is not at all surprised – fading beneath the rush of flight.

Toothless chuckles back at him, glancing over his shoulder and up and waving his tail just a bit, and Hiccup eyes the tempting target speculatively. He could fold his wings and dive and catch at the broad tail-fins, and then they would both tumble and fall and splash in the shallow, roiling channel below.

He knows this for certain. He remembers it from before.

But a cross-wind as the gusts race and bounce and leap from the confining cliff walls knocks him off balance, and Hiccup flails in the air, struggling to stabilize himself and forgetting play. He reacts on instincts developed from a lifetime in the air, and from his familiarity with the flight of dragons, moving the way his cousins would, the way _Toothless_ would, because Toothless’ spike-fins keep him steady…

The touch of the air across his spine is unfamiliar and new-and-different, but Hiccup fights it, veering and struggling to gain altitude, to ride the wind all the way to the end of the gully. If he can reach the gusts that splash upwards, recoiling back from the stone, and land neatly again, then he will trust the new spike-fins he has been working on. They do not balance him as well as the one he made for himself before, but he is determined to make them work.

Even now, struggling as he is, he flies better than he did. Soon he will be steady in the air again, and he is happy enough to flail and fall until then.

His shadow against the stone as he darts past does not have one single fin on its back like a shark anymore. Now he has many smaller spines like the ones that run down Toothless’ back.

The only thing Hiccup really likes about his scale-skins being a made thing is that he can change them when he decides to. He would purr much more over them if his scales would grow there, and not have to be made, if he could look more like his dragon-cousins just because and not because he has made himself so.

His shadow against the stone, flying alongside him and darting over jagged cliffs and perching dragons and much-aggrieved birds, is his best signal of what he looks like, and it is more to his liking, now.

Ahead of him, Toothless leans into the wind and lets it push him further, and Hiccup follows instinctively, trusting the black dragon to sense the best way for them to fly. The shadow against the stone is a fleeting thing, nothing next to Toothless who is with him always, inseparable and constant and necessary. Toothless is more his shadow than any patch of darkness could ever be.

But the wind ambushes him, striking as soon as he relaxes into the whispering caress of the wind across his sides. A new blast of sea air howls into the crevasse, faster and faster, overtaking the dragon-man and slamming into him like a striking paw, treacherous and unprovoked. It catches the tips of his wings and throws him off-balance, sending his back paws up and forcing him into an out-of-control tumble.

Momentarily helpless before the force of the wind, Hiccup twists without thinking, flailing and fighting the urge to close his eyes as the stones of the canyon snap too close, too close! To strike the rock at full speed will hurt, will tear his wings to shreds and claw deeply through his scale-skins to the soft skin beneath, and the memories of bright bruises and painful cuts and wrenched limbs are sharp.

A strangled yelp escapes him as the whole world spins, blurring into _rock sky water rock rock rock sky rock rock_ all shot through with the panicked flailing of _crashing_ and the cringing anticipation of _hurt_ –

Sharp teeth snap around one of his back paws, stopping him a breath away from stone.

Upside-down, Hiccup blinks at the stone in fleeting bafflement, part of him still caught in that deadly tailspin, until a green-grey head lowers itself into his sight, eyes glittering.

_You down you silly laughter laughter laughter you affection silly good laughter gotcha!_ Push-half says as she lowers her head on her long neck. She nudges her horn-nose against him, bristling fangs gaping in amusement. A wisp of green poison-breath leaks from her jaws, and Hiccup sneezes at her in reply. He does not need to look up to feel Pull-half laughing too – muffled as it is, her rumble shudders through his captured paw, and her sparks tickle.

Push-and-Pull chatter _amusement_ to each other as Hiccup untangles his forepaws from the spread of his wings. Freed, he reaches out to touch Push-half’s horn in thanks.

_Down?_ he asks meekly, twitching his captive paw against the fangs that hold it.

Pull-half only chuckles louder. She lowers him towards a small ledge, but pulls him back before he can reach it, shaking him about like a play-thing.

Hiccup sighs, resigned, grumbling _annoyance_. Crashing is a thing that happens, but it is not something he particularly likes. He is very happy to be caught. But this is not a game he wants to play.

_Down!_ he insists, a bit of a whine creeping into his dragonish voice. It is hard to be big and confident and important and speak so that dragons will listen when he is upside-down. _Down me down yes yes you down me yes now!_ he gestures and vocalizes.

Push-half turns her head almost all the way around so that she is upside-down too and they can stare at each other, eyes meeting. _Why?_ she asks, teasing.

Hiccup raises his chin, baring his throat challengingly and glaring, and gestures _down!_

The sound of familiar wings breaks in, and Hiccup twists in Pull-half’s jaws to reach out to Toothless as the black dragon comes to a hovering halt in midair. Toothless darts in close enough to touch, nudging at the outstretched paw with his nose, but his wings are too broad and they slap at the stone. Toothless tries to pull away and hover further out, but the winds still shove at him and instead he darts back and forth, circling. _Mine!_ he protests. _Mine mine mine give he mine yes yes certain-sure mine Hiccup-beloved!_

Push-half twists right-way-up again and raises her head as if she were a snake and not half of a two-heads cousin, swaying from side to side in the still-howling winds as she stares down Toothless. _Us catch,_ she says, snapping her teeth. Pull-half mutters _agreement_ , still holding Hiccup by that back paw, and bobs her head to shake him again.

_No!_ Toothless objects, and they snarl at each other. There is no real fire in the argument, Hiccup can tell. Knowing dragons as he does, he can distinguish a play-fight for the fun of it from a real quarrel without fail. Push-and-Pull know perfectly well that Hiccup and Toothless belong together. Every dragon in their flock knows this, and so do many others beyond them, strangers met in their wandering, bristled at and chirped to and prowled around until they have decided whether they will be enemies or friends or simply turn their shoulders to each other and pretend they do not exist. Even some humans know this.

Hiccup does not particularly mind being upside-down. Flying upside-down is _very_ much fun. But as Toothless dives closer to land on the ledge Push-and-Pull are perched on, pushing and shoving and snapping at them in play, he hisses a bit to be quarreled over like a toy - _still_.

He has always been the smallest dragon in their nest. There are many different colors and shapes and sizes of dragons there, far away back home, but even the littlest hatchlings grow quickly and are bigger than him again. So for most of his life the dragon-boy who vaguely remembered that his name sounded a bit like the noise _Hiccup_ had been picked up in dragons’ jaws and stolen and snatched and flown and run with and hidden in a great game of keep-away, the pet of all the nest.

He is not that hatchling anymore – he and Toothless travel further than anyone, and they break traps that bite and tear dragons, and they face down humans, and when enemies threaten their nest they _fight_. They led the others here at the command of their Alpha, their king. They were the ones who found this place as a good nest for dragons, and they are the ones watching over the new nest as the broken-away flock settles in and learns their new home.

Hiccup feels the responsibility keenly. Not long ago he believed that he had endangered his family and his home with his recklessness; that he had led a most terrible and terrifying enemy to their hidden refuge, and that all that happened then – the destruction, the deaths, the fear, the trespass and the violation of it – was his fault.

Instead he and his Toothless-half are forgiven, or not wrong to begin with, and leaders of dragons, now. Now all that they have learned in their wanderings is turned to finding new places for dragons to live and hunt and claim for their own, and when winter freezes the sun from the sky and chases it away to hide and doze until spring, then they will stand before the king of ice and be proud that they have done all he commanded them to do.

Reaching out, Hiccup catches the edges of his wings and slips them over his paws again. When Push-half moves so that she can see him, he flares his wings and shrieks as two-heads cousin/s do when they are frightened, mimicking the rattling of their wings and claws and fangs.

Push-and-Pull startle together, and Pull-half lets him go at last.

Hiccup tumbles to a ledge ungracefully, his scales scuffed with dust, but unhurt.

Gurgling with laughter of his own, Toothless pounces over Push-and-Pull and takes to the air again, half-leaping and half-flying to rejoin his other self. A stone collapses beneath him as he tries to jump from it, sending him scrabbling and clawing at the cliff face.

Without hesitation, Hiccup pounces at him, tangling his clever paws into the flying-with harness wrapped around Toothless’ chest and shoulders, careful of his claws. At his touch Toothless pushes away from the cliff, and although the fierce winds tearing down the channel lash at their sides, they are soon flying again, bound together and safe.

Push-and-Pull chatter _laughter-laughter_ at them in unison, and Hiccup chirrs _gratitude_ back as Toothless beats his wings and takes them up and out of the canyon and into the open air above the island.

Free of the closed-in rock walls, Toothless veers into the wind and soars, gliding easily, and Hiccup nudges a paw against his ribs as the black dragon rolls one eye back at him in a grin. Sprawling out to rest his chin on the back of Toothless’ head, Hiccup huffs _resignation_ , dismissing the failed flight as not important.

Below them dragons climb and perch and race and dig into the shattered island, glints of color sparking like fire against the grey-brown weathered stone and the hissing grass that ripples like waves and the strong stubborn plants that grow twisted from cracks in the stone and seem dead but live. Flying home from the sea, Ambush darts past them, returning from good hunting and chirping _hello hello you happy hello yes hunting good hunting not-hungry proud happy me hello!_

Patrolling is perfectly natural behavior for dragons, as they hunt and play with their flock-mates and watch for humans who hunt them, and dangers from falling stone or great waves or fires too fierce to play in, and stranger-intruders who are not of the flock and must be driven away so they cannot steal food or safe places. So it is instinct rather than thought that sets their course on an easy circuit of the island, watchful and careful.

Hiccup and Toothless are willing wanderers, but most dragons have a home where they stay and know well. All of the dragons here had a home, not long ago. They could go back, retracing the long flight, but they have chosen to come to a new place now where there is more to eat, and more space to fly and perch, and where dragons can chirp to each other softly and not have to roar over the very great voice of all the overflowing nest.

Not everyone is comfortable here yet, _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ know as they fly close to a tangle of dragons curled up in the bright sun. Even that warmth cannot ease the restlessness of Bitter and Scatters Stones as they rise from their resting to pace and rise to their hind legs and look out over the ocean. Their bodies mutter _new place new place_ under every movement and gesture. Their tails snap sharply, and their paws shift against the ground, and when a dragon’s cry echoes across the island – _where? where? you where mine hatchling mine where distress mine hatchling anxious edge-of-fear,_ Look At Me shrieks, her voice echoing out of one of the gullies – they startle as if they were small hatchlings run far from their mother and their home-nest. When they settle they do so uneasily, wings left spread and open, ready to leap and fly and be far away.

The smallest of movements is enough to draw Toothless’ attention to him, and Hiccup grins in answer to the bigger dragon’s _what?_ expression. He glances over to where Bitter is trying to look at everything at once, head up and eyes staring, and the little dragon walks his paws across Toothless’ shoulders slow and careful and sneaking, crouching as if ready to pounce even as he rides.

Toothless snorts _no!_ at him, but his tongue flashes in a dragon’s grin at the thought of sneaking up on and startling Bitter, who has never been willing to play with them.

So they fly on.

There were no dragons here when the dragon-pair first came here, on their way home to their hidden nest in the far north. Winter was not yet snapping at their tail, and the sun was still burning high and bright and tempting.

Empty islands, Hiccup and Toothless have learned, are more worrying than islands with dragons on them. There was an island with many good places to land and to fish from and grass to roll in, but when they landed there were many poison-flowers hidden among the grass and they could not stay there. There was an island with a bright clear stream that had _worst-of-all poison-not-safe eels_ in it. And there are many, many islands where dragons cannot go because there are humans there already and _pfikingr_ are hard to chase away when they have made nests for themselves.

But there are no humans here, only a single ship far away that did not come close enough to be chased and flamed at. There are no biting leeches. There are no other dragons to yowl and snarl and bite.

Still, flying is a goodness always and a joy. Hiccup lifts his face to the wind and closes his eyes to it, letting it lick at his tangled mane like a dragon-cousin in the darkness of their home caves. Beneath his paws, Toothless hums _joy_ back to him, and their voices harmonize into a content chirring _you me we us happy together love us sky us safe good yes love-you happy us together flying sky good easy…_

For a time they play in the air among the high cliffs and the deep gullies and the broad flat bluffs where the wind tears through. They listen to the cries of the many flock-mates that have followed them here. Glider flies alongside them and Hiccup watches his broad wings with envy. Lurks in Pit raises his head from the nest he has dug deeper and deeper into a crack, but will not let them sneak past him to see what he has made. Toothless sings _looking_ over the stocky dragon-cousin’s shoulder and Lurks in Pit snarls and chases them away before he can hear the shape of the cave.

In the gullies, many birds scream raucous and angry at their shadow as it brushes against the cliffs. There is _good_ hunting here. Dragons will happily eat birds’ eggs when they can get them, and the nests tucked into every crevice – and their aggrieved defenders – are easy prey.

_Where? mine where mine angry mine hatchling?_ Look At Me is still demanding, and the birds shriek back at her. There are many new hiding places in the broken-open island, and all hatchlings think that hiding is a good game, so Hiccup and Toothless fly on unconcerned. Her cries remind them only of many such hiding-games when they were littler and slightly less silly.

A smaller sound has become familiar since they brought their flock-mates to the broken-open island, and Toothless lands on the headland signaling _resigned_ and _annoyed_ and snorting _silly!_

Hiccup purrs to him and pets him calm again, slipping from his beloved dragon-companion’s shoulders and sidling cautiously towards the clump of brambles that spill over the edge of the cliff and snarl around the boulders and small hillocks and dips in the earth. The brambles shake violently, and squeak.

_Worry?_ the dragon-man whistles questioningly. He moves easily from his back paws to all of them and back again, stepping lightly around the edges of the bramble patch.

The brambles go still except where the wind rustles them, and the little dragon trapped within whines _sorry hurting sorry angry scared hurting angry!_

Toothless sits down with a _thump_ and snorts _disdain_ , which only makes the fledgling angrier.

_Out out out out out!_ she yelps. _Angry! Fight!_

Hiccup ducks away as she draws in a deep breath, and a plume of fire erupts, singeing the thorn bushes in front of her nose. But the rest of the patch holds her too tightly, and when she struggles to get free, her young scales are soft. She falls still again with a yelp.

A moment goes by. Toothless looks away pointedly, admiring the clouds, all his signals saying _not interested_. Hiccup grins up at him from where he has come to rest, leaning against the black dragon’s front paws, and chirrups _easy calm easy safe no-fear_ to the half-grown dragon.

_C’mon_ , he adds to Toothless, reaching up to scratch at his other half’s jaw with his soft-claws, his lethal claws tucked back into their place on his belt. _Please?_

Finally Toothless relents, ducking his head to nudge at his partner, pushing Hiccup aside, then lifting it again to flame at the brambles. His blasting fire tears through them, charring clinging thorns and allowing the trapped fledgling to pull herself free.

At once she turns around, twisting herself back on her tail, and blazes angrily at the nearby thorns. She stomps the burnt pieces underfoot and shrieks her indignation.

Hiccup chirps _gratitude_ to Toothless for her, but rolls his eyes anyway. The thorns will grow back, hiding the many small holes again. It is not the first time one of the younger dragons has chased a wary rabbit into the tangle of brambles and gotten stuck. He understands the temptation. The rabbits are fast and just the right size to chase, and they are soft to touch when they are caught and shaken or bitten through. But the hatchlings are learning to hunt still and leap with their claws when they should strike with their fires.

_Hurt!_ Thorn wails, quickly tiring of punishing the briars. She limps over to the dragon-pair and cringes to the earth, pawing at her nose and biting at her claws. _Hurt me sad sad little pity-me sad hurt pity-me!_

_Silly!_ Toothless huffs at her again. She abandons her pretense of helplessness to glare up at him, flashing eyes and showing the barest line of teeth, and pours all her wailing on Hiccup instead.

_Hurt!_ she cries, butting her head against his chest and almost knocking him over as she tries to climb onto him as she would a much bigger dragon.

Laughing in chirps and purrs and his open-mouthed dragon’s grin, the dragon-man pushes her away and clambers back to a comfortable sitting, settling back on his heels and catching her muzzle in his clever paws. He scratches under her jaw absently as he looks her over, and Thorn falls still, purring counterpoint broken with whimpers of _hurt hurt me small hurt pity-me_.

Toothless curls up at his back and settles a paw at his side in a possessive embrace as Hiccup works, nipping the hidden ends of broken-off thorns from the soft flesh of her nose and jaw and the inside of her mouth from biting at the catching brambles. Hiccup knows now that his clever paws are different because they are _human_ paws, but the knowledge that once stepped close to destroying him at a blow has scarred over some with time and the constant acceptance of his dragon-family.

Those he loves, those who love him, do not care that his paws are human paws. They care only that they are _clever_ paws that can heal dragons when they are wounded, or steal shining pieces from biting traps so that their jaws fall open, or open cages, or scratch noses, or draw shapes, or carry small things gently, or pet dragons, so Hiccup cares only for those things too.

_Still!_ he commands sternly, tapping her sore nose when Thorn yelps and tries to pull away. _No-fuss!_ She freezes obediently as he pulls a sharp-thorn for sewing with from one of his holding-things pockets and fishes for the end of a thorn with it. The thorns under her claws are not buried as deeply as those in her jaws, and come free easily.

Thorn is not their hatchling. She is stocky and green and gold and when she is big she will have soft tendrils beneath her jaw, and she does not look like either of them. But that does not matter. She is _flock_. She is family. And a hatchling is everyone’s baby.

Neither Hiccup nor Toothless consciously reason that they survived only because a dragon flock cares for all its hatchlings. They remember only distantly their own mother, who was Hiccup’s mother, and then was Toothless’ mother too because they are a single self and _the same._ But even when they did not have a mother of their own anymore, they had been cared for and loved.

Hiccup has all the family he needs, and he is happy. He has Toothless at his back, nosing at his new spine-fins as he works and humming _this curious yes good like yes laughing good this you yes like_. He knows that Toothless would love him no matter what he looks like – they are halves of a whole, they are part of each other – and that is a very great comfort. But it is good that Toothless likes his new fins, and a purr rumbles from him as Toothless’ nose pets up and down his spine in soft nudges and warm breath. He has Thorn crowding against him, yelping softly as his soft-claws pinch or his sharp-claw blade presses against her scales to lure a thorn from its burrow in her flesh and watching in horrified fascination as the smallest droplet of blood smears against the bright blade.

Thorn is as big as he is, and soon she will be bigger, and her fangs near his throat are longer and sharper than his, and she can breathe fire while he _still_ cannot yet, but Hiccup does not hesitate to snap at her. _No!_ he snarls, catching her jaw and turning her to look at the remains of the thorns. He growls a warning that means _danger_ and _stay-away!_ and a shriek that means _no-chase_ , the cry of a dragon veering away from a hunt.

She chatters _want want want_ , eyes flicking to the half-buried holes where darting rabbits disappear.

Hiccup sighs, and jabs her nose with the last dug-out thorn.

Thorn shrieks _shock_ , leaping into the air like a startled seagull. She lands curled up tight and defensive, staring at him in betrayal.

_Stay-away!_ he growls.

She hunches her shoulders and growls back, her still-small fins like a fish’s tail ruffling indignantly.

Toothless rests his head on Hiccup’s shoulder and snarls louder, snapping out his teeth, and she crouches _surrender_.

She sidles away still growling even as she does, lifting her head and pretending that she has only now heard Look At Me shrieking still. _Calling_ , she suggests with her movements. _Me listen listen calling that go yes me go see? see? good good me_. Thorn glances over at them to see if they believe her.

Hiccup does not believe her at all, but his half-snarl is not for her. Look At Me makes noise always and waves her wings and hits many things with her tail and leaps into places where there is no space for her, but it is not good that she should still be crying out.

And there are not so many hiding places on this island that her hatchling could hide from all the flock living here now.

Uneasily, he rises to his full height to listen for Look At Me, tracking her voice and looking out across the much-shattered island plain.

Most human children are eventually told not to run about on all fours. Hiccup never was. Growing up in a network of caves and a realm of cliffs and crevasses, among dragons, he has never been fully comfortable standing upright. It is a good trick to be able to carry things in his paws and still be able to move, and he is more than capable of a full-speed sprinting run, but he prefers to keep his balance low. He stands upright much like a bear does – able to do so, even for a while, but ready always to drop to all his paws again.

The ever-present wind snaps at his overlong auburn mane as he looks out over the island; a slightly built young man of twenty-one, the lines of his face thrown into sharp relief by too many hungry winters, an alert and intelligent light in his green eyes. His try-and-see assemblage of dragon scales and leather and fur is broken by occasional stolen bits of metal and whittled bone. It protects him from the harsh northern weather and the fierce wilds and gives him the look of the dragon he believes himself, but it also hides the scars of his feral existence, etched into his body and across his skin.

But only the most casual glance would mistake him for the human he was born as, and the illusion – seen but not true – shatters as soon as he moves, sinuous and abrupt by turns, as reptilian as his borrowed scales. The light in his eyes is dragon-fire, and the expressions that transform his face are trained to the manner of dragons; more than a year after learning his first deliberate words of a human tongue since childhood, his voice is still unmistakably that of a dragon.

Falling easily back to all his paws, which puts his head level with Toothless’ as the black dragon lies sphinxlike and watchful, Hiccup clicks _don’t-like_ and _curious_ and _wondering_ and _anxious_ , the sounds tumbling over each other and merging with the movements of his body that Toothless recognizes as Hiccup setting himself to track down and prowl around something that is not as it should be, something that itches like sand under scales. His signals say _mine mine mine_ in the way that means _ours_.

They go together. They always have.

Thorn sees nothing of this, sidling away back towards the crevasse that tears deepest into the island. It does not end in a sharp updraft, but instead a sheltered place between the ocean below and the wind-torn plains above.

It is not quite a cave, or a lake and many meadows protected by ice, but it is where many of the new flock have dug out and trodden down and burnt their nests, and it is from there that Look At Me is crying out, notes of _fear_ bleeding from her calls.

Toothless pads back towards the nesting place, snorting at Thorn when she glances back at him following. All her body goes tight with embarrassment and she moves faster, scuttling away. Perched on the black dragon’s shoulders again, where he is most comfortable, Hiccup _hough_ s with laughter, a small noise barely louder than the wind.

The hidden grotto has many overhangs and ledges and jagged pieces that are good for sheltering under and climbing on, twisted by the wind and the mysterious ways of stone. Thorn flutters from one to the next awkwardly, claws slipping. Toothless who is bigger leaps easily from the open plain to the new nesting places their flock-cousins have made here, leaving the tearing wind to shriek its triumph up above. Its cries fade, and the tangled-together noises of many dragons rise.

_Distress!_ Look At Me wails loudest of all, coiling and lunging and flashing her fangs at the others who shrink away from her and do not challenge or protest, even when fire catches across her scales, crackling and flaring. Neighbor stands steady and does not retreat, but he looks away and hunches his shoulders, refusing to move and unwilling to fight. Beneath an outcropping of rock, Mute spreads a wing over her own hatchlings. The bright scar across her throat where humans caught at her with sharp things ripples as she breathes in air and her throat swells, but her defensive snarl is only a whisper.

Look At Me steps away from her, still. Mute’s hatchlings are smaller and must not be threatened, even if their muffled squeaks are more curious than frightened. Mute carried them here as eggs in her belly, all the flock swarming around her and nudging at her and bringing her fish and even carrying her on their backs when she might be tired, and her mate clicked and bristled and guarded her very fiercely so that she snapped at him, but even then he would not go far from her. The eggs were laid here, and burst open to be hatchlings here, and they are so small that those few she allows close still lick at them as if they might have the rich thick ocean inside eggs on their scales.

Mute’s mate who is Loud for both of them races to her side and growls, a roar rumbling through him, and Look At Me turns her tail to them and darts back to the hollow that is her nest, rooting through it as if her hatchling will be hidden among the ashes.

The rattling of Thorn’s clumsy descent catches her attention, and Look At Me lifts her head and snatches the fledgling from the stone in a single sharp movement. Thorn writhes in her jaws fearlessly, protesting as Look At Me tastes her.

Thorn is not her hatchling, and Look At Me releases her onto the sandy, ash-smudged ground of the grotto with a low howl of _disappointment_.

Hiccup twists inside with her _hurting_ , and Toothless moves without needing to ask, understanding his beloved-self’s thoughts and wishes through the smallest of signals of breathing and movement and half-vocalized unconscious sound. Together they creep towards Look At Me with careful steps, staying low and inoffensive.

_Reassurance_ , the dragon-man croons to her when she turns one golden eye to them. _Sympathy curious wondering safe calm easy breathing reassurance no-fear safe good_.

_No,_ she wails, her flames all over dying out into wisps of smoke. _Where where mine looking flying looking where mine hatchling mine worry worry worry scared!_ She rears up, spreading her wings and looking all around, and screams _desperation_ , the piercing sound that echoes across the island, calling her only hatchling home.

A rattle of stones is stocky Big Friendly, heaving his bulk over the edge of the grotto and sliding inelegantly to a halt at the base of the cliff. He snaps up the broken-away stones and swallows them down as they come to rest against him, long tongue licking out and capturing them to be munched and devoured. Look At Me wails _where?_ to him, and he cowers beneath her gaze. His tongue does not loll and pant with laughter and happiness to see any of his flock. All of his signals say _nothing no-help don’t-know_.

Look At Me collapses to the earth and wails.

Hiccup climbs from Toothless’ shoulders and settles at her side, scratching her eye-ridges and nosing at her, humming _sympathy_.

But soon others return home, Finds the Sunset and Smooth Scales and Ate An Owl all looking for their fledglings too, and no one on the island can find them anywhere however much they search very hard.

Dragons cannot count, but they can keep track of each other very well. They are happiest in a flock, and social, and friendly, and they understand _missing_.

_You?_ Ate An Owl whimpers, turning his eyes down to the dragon-pair when they return from flying over the island searching. _You far flying yes flying you lead good yes please looking help you far!_

Toothless rumbles with _pride_ but there is _worry_ beneath it, so quiet and hidden that only Hiccup who is part of him can sense it. The muscles beneath his scales and Hiccup’s paws tense, not to leap and fly high and far but to crouch and be small.

_Here_ , Hiccup reminds him gently, spreading one paw open and broad against his shoulder and stroking back to rest beside his heart. They are together so they are strong and they will figure this out together.

But he understands Toothless’ desire to be small beneath the eyes of so many dragon-cousins looking to them as if they were Cloudjumper-mother’s-mate who knows many things or even the _king_ who sent them here and commanded them to lead and guard. It should not be so very different from the eyes of flock-mates watching them as they tell the stories of their wandering in movements and cries and pretending, but that is only play and this is a most important thing.

Instead he spreads his shoulders and stares back, baring his teeth and snarling _protect_. Unconsciously, his paws slip into the dragon-claws he wears like his own flesh and curl them ready to fly and to fight.

_Us_ , he asserts, one paw resting on Toothless’ head, the other tapping over the heart in his own small chest. _Us yes go certain-determined looking us fly!_

Toothless gathers himself and leaps even as his beloved-companion tangles all his paws into the flying-with, the two of them coordinating like a single body. At once they are far above the island, the wind below howling its rage that they are too quick for it to catch and swat away.

Perhaps the fledglings have flown away elsewhere, even though this is a good place and home to them now with all their flock-mates here, and if so then the dragon-pair will fly far and fast and find them. Or perhaps the missing ones will come home soon laughing at the very good hiding place they have found that not even big dragons can find them in, and then all will be well again.

But they will search elsewhere. _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ are always ready to fly and be out on their own and explore new places, and _they_ will not shudder and shift and mutter _new place new place_ always. They are tiny and fleeting beside their Alpha – they cannot imagine themselves Alphas for real – but they can pretend, when eyes are turned to them because their true king is far away.

They do not imagine that an enemy might have _taken_ the fledglings. In all of their flying none of their cousins have seen any strangers not of the flock or _pfikingr_ ships sneaking up on their new home. So the dragon-pair do not snarl and fly warily, only high and circling and chasing the wind for scents and faraway sounds.

Besides, they can both remember many times when they were smaller, when flock-mates came looking for _them_ when they had wandered away from home and put their noses into somewhere they should not have and dug trouble out of its den.

* * *

_To be continued._


	2. The Ice

**_Flashfreeze,_ ** **Part Two: The Ice**

Toothless lifts one paw and shakes meltwater from it fastidiously, scattering droplets. The ice beneath his paws is melting away beneath his fires inside, and behind him in his tracks are many small puddles where he has stood. It buzzes against his paws as if it has bees inside. There are no bees in ice, but when he drops his nose to snort _hush!_ at it the bees fly into his nose and buzz there.

He sneezes at it, shaking his head and blowing at the bees that are not, and springs away.

At home the ice of their king does not melt so easily, and many dragons walk across it and fly near it and leap to it, but this is ice that floats alone. It drifts and sings to itself and the open sea, flashing bright. Deep inside it is blue as the ocean, and the edges of its colors hide under his nose and disappear when Toothless turns to find them.

There was an iceberg already before, but this one is bigger and there are many more places to search. The high cliff that faces the sun is too steep to land on; they would slip away flailing and splash into the bright ocean if they did not fly away quickly. Elsewhere sliding would be a good fun shrieking-laughter flailing scrambling game, but they do not know this ice and ice has hidden fangs sometimes beneath the blinding-blue water. Over the peak it flows away into an arch like part of a cave cut away and dragged out into the light, binding the edges of it together to make a small lagoon within the ice. Pieces of it bigger than _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ together have tumbled across its sides, and Toothless does not like to go near them because they look as if they are balanced to leap and fall.

Scars and shadows and ripples dance across it, white on white, and small caves no more than cracks in the ice catch the sun and hide too-bright shadows deeper within. The sharp crags of its spines drop away to pretend-like edges that vanish beneath the waves sometimes, the water clear and sky-blue and deadly, deadly cold.

The iceberg howls _lonely empty lonely lost lost grieving lost lonely sad_ and Toothless’ ear-flaps go back. His claws dig into the softening ice and it cracks beneath his paws, the meltwater hissing and threatening to slip away beneath his warmth and his weight.

It unsettles Toothless that icebergs should talk. Hiccup says it is only the wind, and not to be afraid, crooning _comfort_ and _beloved-one,_ stroking Toothless’ nose and steady across his sides with soft paws and no teasing mocking laughter in his voice or his body. But the voices of icebergs sound like dragon-cries, almost, and there is only loneliness to them and despair. They wander always, but not as _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ do, wandering together and with their nest to return to. Icebergs wander alone, and when they meet each other they turn away or they fight, ripping away ice and bleeding snow.

_Lonely!_ the iceberg wails.

Snarling, Toothless snaps out his fangs and roars _here us here yes brave fierce fearless here yes us!_ in reply.

The ice shifts and shudders, snapping like bones, and its sides heave a deep sigh. It does not roll as smaller icebergs do, but still it is like when _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ were smaller, playing across the backs and sides and flanks of patient bigger dragons.

_Toothless-beloved?_ Hiccup whistles and clicks, turning away from the narrow gash in the ice he was peering into, his voice thick with _love-you us together love-always yes good happy-together_ but tinged with _worry-uncertainty._ The hatchlings they search for, the little dragon-cousins who have wandered away from the island that was to be their new home, are not in the small crevasse. They were not on the other iceberg, and only the faintest trace of fire still coiling through the air led the dragon-pair to that ice. Flying a wide and wandering path, they found a forest of sea stacks, but no hatchlings, and not even a scent of them or a track of small paws.

_Startled threat where? where?_ He rears up a bit to glance around, raising his claws defensively and twisting to look all over.

The black dragon steps out of the new puddles and pads to him, nudging his nose against Hiccup’s throat and breathing _no-threat safe good us sorry sorry_.

Hiccup rubs their faces together affectionately, forgiving him at once, and Toothless chuckles, pushing harder to shove his smaller half over into the thin snow that coats the ice.

Yowling mock- _outrage_ and beneath it _laughter affection happy amused cold this cold!_ Hiccup scrapes some of it up in his claws and tosses it at his other self, splattering snow across Toothless’ nose and jaws. Toothless leaps at him to miss and skid up more snow, and they wrestle across the gentle slope, the bigger dragon snapping at his smaller partner teasingly and licking snow from his fur only to spit it back all over him again and make him shriek and splutter.

Toothless wins the brief squabble easily, pinning Hiccup with a single paw and holding him there as his beloved-companion thrashes and yowls and pretends to slash at the offending paw with his claws turned away. By the time they have scattered all the snow away and left only the bare ice flaming back at the sun in its surprise, both dragon and dragon-feral are laughing and panting and warm as summer again.

It is best of all that they are well again, Toothless knows deep inside, gurgling laughter and purring _love-you you me we us together yes good good happy-content_ bubbling together from his throat. For a time after a great wrongness came to their nest and tried to destroy their family and their king and their home, they were broken and torn apart. Their hearts did not run together like racing paws but limped and shied away trailing their tails low and shamed and hurting. Hiccup was hiding even from _Toothless_ inside, hoarding his thought-of hurts-not-seen as if he were starving and a dragon alone with only enemies watching. Toothless does not like to think of it.

Toothless can think about _always_ – he and Hiccup are _always_ , essential – so he can think about _never_ , and he will _never, never_ let Hiccup imagine that he is alone or wrong inside again.

So it is good that they are flying far and wandering and exploring and living again, because Hiccup is so much happier when they are busy together, and Toothless is happy along with him as Hiccup- _heart-of-mine_ bares his throat in _giving up_ even as his eyes flash _pretending ready-to-leap only-playing_.

Beneath them, the iceberg cries out _sad!_ again, and Toothless startles away, leaping forward and crouching over his Hiccup-self protectively.

_No-fear,_ Hiccup reassures him, drawing the backs of his claws across the scales of Toothless’ chest. He scrambles out from beneath the bigger dragon and leaps to a small lump of ice. Pawing at his fur, he shakes the last of the snow from it and yips faintly at the cold of it against his skin. _C’mon_ , he gestures, and shows _searching_ with his body, head high and jaw open to call out.

The dragon-pair are not terribly worried about the missing ones. _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ disappear from the company of their flock often, and they wandered in and out of trouble often enough even when they were smaller. But they search to please the flock-mates still on their new island-home, those calling for their hatchlings to return.

Only the ice answers their whistles and cries, and Toothless flinches as it moans _lonely_ , long and drawn out and dying away. Their wrestling was loud enough to wake anything, but the black dragon steps softly as if the iceberg might stir and rise and yawn beneath them, shaking them away like the snow. But he refuses to cower, because Hiccup says icebergs do not live and Hiccup is clever.

Ice is a familiar thing like home, but still Toothless walks ready to leap and with his teeth ready to snap.

One of his paws breaks into a frozen-over puddle, just frost over meltwater, and Toothless draws back snorting in indignation. But his irritation turns to puzzlement as he raises his head and looks around.

This is a new place they have not been to yet, as they search across the ice. Toothless did not stand here and wait for it to melt. And when he bats at the frost, tentatively, it shatters away over a puddle much bigger than his paw.

_Here!_ Toothless yelps, leaping over it to dig at the ice. At once many puddles splash open, as if small dragons had curled up here and rested.

The hatchlings were here! They are still on the trail!

But no counterpoint answers him, and Toothless glances over his shoulder, unsettled.

Only the endless white and grey shadows and deep blue ice-heart sprawl out before him, unbroken by any small dark-scaled dragonish figure.

Toothless’ heart-fires freeze colder than the iceberg, and his small shriek of _triumph_ twists into a whine of deafening _fear_.

He cannot think, cannot move with the terror that sweeps over him. Panic rises in his throat like a scream of pain, and thrashes there so that he trembles all over and his cries of _where? where mine where Hiccup-mine Hiccup-beloved where where fear-fear-fear where?_ strangle each other into the smallest of terrified sounds.

The black dragon does not like it at all when he cannot see his Hiccup-self, even when Toothless has seen him move away behind a stone and knows where he has gone. Even that is _very_ nervous-making. Always possessive, always protective, the tearing soul-deep wound of having Hiccup _taken away_ has scarred Toothless deeply, and he cannot endure the thought of his beloved little always-companion being taken away _again_. It is an unbearable thought, that Hiccup should be _gone._

A small sound and a twitch of movement breathes life into his heart-fires again, a snowdrift that was not there before shuddering, and Toothless pounces at the hateful snow that has hidden his beloved-one from him.

Digging at the snow desperately, but careful of his claws, Toothless unearths a blindly waving paw. He snaps away his fangs to snatch at it gently and pull Hiccup out of the small avalanche, muttering and whining _fear worry what? what? you? worry you here silly what? silly careful no!_

Hiccup thinks it is funny, crouching _sorry sorry_ and laughing at himself with an embarrassed tongue-flashing grin. Toothless is not amused.

The hatchlings were here but now they are not, Toothless shows him, coiling around him and shoving him almost into the broken-open puddles. Hiccup clicks his claws against a fragment of new frost and turns his face up to croon _praise_ at the bigger dragon, but Toothless does not lift his jaw and preen. Instead he pushes and nudges at Hiccup until his companion is on his shoulders again and they can fly away.

He does not care how lonely the iceberg is. It cannot have his Hiccup- _beloved_.

* * *

It is still strange a bit to wander with a purpose. Since they were old enough to fly far – since Toothless was big enough to carry his dragon-boy on his shoulders and not be tired – they have chased the winds and the stars and their own tails to decide where to go, and if there was a game to play or something to chase or others to meet or _pfikingr-_ enemies to sneak away from along the way, then that was the way of things.

But now they go where they are asked to go, and they choose their prey before they pounce at it, and Toothless is not entirely sure he likes this new thing of theirs.

It is _good_ to do as their king commanded them, to find new safe places for dragons. When he tries very hard, Toothless can distantly imagine a _one day_ when many places will be filled with their friends. Then they will have many safe places scattered all over where they can run to or stand and fight or sleep in safety with the company of their family all around.

_Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ wander very far, but then home and safety is very far away. But their need to wander has always been stronger.

It is fine to be leaders in play or because the hunt was theirs first and they brought others to join them. But Toothless does not want to run and hunt only because others of the flock have told them to.

They should come and go as they please, returning when they wish and flying away when they need to. That is the _rightness_ of things. They have many far places to be. Toothless does not know where those places are, or why they are interesting, but he would like to find out, and he knows that Hiccup wonders just as keenly and watches the horizon as restlessly.

Of course they will protect the missing fledglings if they are in trouble, to disappear so and not return. But to have the new small flock on the shattered-open island look to them is like being chased after by hatchlings, all of them tugging at his tail and demanding more stories.

Toothless decides that when they have found the missing ones and taken them back to the new island, _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ together will fly free and aimless again. He will fly when Hiccup-beloved is dozing and half-asleep on his shoulders and fly and fly until they are far away in a new place. It will be a good surprise.

_Where-wondering curious doubtful edge-of-concern where?_ Hiccup chirps from Toothless’ shoulders, sprawling out and resting his chin on his paws – Toothless can feel his companion’s claws on the back of his head, light and careful. One of those paws shifts away for a moment, and the shadow of it waves across Toothless’ vision in a wide arc that means _everywhere…_

Toothless shrugs, a ripple that runs through his body all the way to his tail, which twitches to meet the wind. He grumbles _maybe-doubtful_ , struggling to guess where hatchlings may have gone. It is hard to track scents over the ocean, and small dragons are not reeking _pfikingr_ ships.

There is very much ocean in the world. In all their wandering _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ still have not run out of ocean to see. But there are not so many places that small dragons could land and rest on that ocean, and the dragon-pair has flown in this sky before.

He knows that the small ones must rest, because when they flew to the new island the missing ones were carried some on the backs and in the jaws of their bigger flock-mates. So they have only to look for islands.

This is hard to explain, but Toothless tries. He whistles a signal for _landing_ and pretends to fly slow and erratic and tired. _Yes?_ he asks, rolling an eye back to look at Hiccup.

Hiccup cannot see anything wrong with that, so they fly on, searching for the next place for landing. They have spent much of their shared life this way, together in the sky, and Toothless is as comfortable with his partner on his shoulders as Hiccup is to be there, the flying-with wrapped around them. Both are entirely at ease but alert still, listening to the sounds that carry far across the waves and watching the movements of the clouds and the horizon for islands to land on and call for hatchlings across. Toothless breathes in the sharp sea air and savors the smell of the open sky.

But Toothless finds it curious that they should have found the trail on the _ice_ , and not the forest of sea stacks, or the small islet before any icebergs, where there were good rocks to climb and tangled-up trees to hide among, even if the warmth of the long afternoon of the late summer has not yet been chased away by howling winter.

There are many icebergs, though, and when one shimmers in the distance Toothless sets his course for it at once. When they fly closer he can see that it is smaller than the lonely one, and it is flat and protected in the middle. Wide claws curl upwards all around it like one of Hiccup’s paws turned up to hold a small thing carefully. It has many broken-off edges that gleam as vicious and threatening as his rider’s sharp-claw blade turned against a threat.

There are many good places to land on, although Toothless eyes the claws of it warily. He does not _think_ it will close on them like the jaws of a biting trap, but Toothless does not trust icebergs.

_No!_ he protests as Hiccup begins to untangle himself from the flying-with harness and climb down to the ice. _No no no no you stay!_ Toothless makes a small startled leap and twists aside and sidles away, and Hiccup clings tightly to the cords of it with a baffled yelp, clicking _confusion_.

_Up,_ Toothless insists, glancing back over his shoulder and glaring _stubborn determined you me stubborn yes sure_. This iceberg is not wailing _lonely_ , but he is reluctant to let Hiccup out of his sight again.

Hiccup rolls his eyes, showing _resigned_ and _amused_ and _teasing_ a bit all at once, but obeys, remaining on his dragon-partner’s shoulders as they explore the new iceberg.

This ice does not have many hiding places and hollows, even for small dragons, but Toothless pads across it anyway, sniffing at ledges where fledglings might perch and dips in the ice where they might rest. None of the crevasses are deep enough to fall into, and even the biggest needs only a small leap to step over.

He has just spread his wings for a brief flight to one of the claws when all the ice shifts beneath his paws, lurching. Both dragons startle and flinch and stare as the other side of the ice sheds pieces of itself, crumbling and cracking, and the iceberg moans its _hurting_.

None of the ice flies at them, but they thrum uneasily to each other.

As they wander, Toothless sneaks glances over his shoulder, watching Hiccup. His companion has wrapped part of his scale-skins over his head against the cold, hiding his fur behind dragon-scales and pieces of other furs and making a shadow for his face. For a moment as he turns his head to look around, focused and thinking and hunting, he seems to be all over dragon-scales. _No one_ else would think to change their scales so, and Toothless takes as much pride in Hiccup’s inventiveness as if the black dragon had thought of such a thing himself. Toothless rumbles inside in an amused full-bodied purr and his heart-fires blaze with a fondness no less than adoration.

He still wonders sometimes if there are any others _like them_ out there. There was one once, he knows, and it hurts still that they never met that one while it lived. But if others are, they will have to be others _like them,_ and not only like this half of him.

If that half-imagined stranger were to snarl at and reject Hiccup, Toothless would leap at them flaming and screaming and biting and tearing until that one backed down and rolled over in surrender, or _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ would turn and fly away so fast that the stranger would never find them again.

Not even for someone _like them_ would Toothless stay with someone who did not accept his Hiccup-half too.

_Look!_ Hiccup gestures, tapping at Toothless’ ribs with a back paw to catch his attention. Fleeting sparks of color flicker back from the edge of the ice by the water. They are only faint flashes, but when they fly over in a quick leap, the colors are not ice-colors but a scatter of fish scales, cast aside as if the fish had been torn apart and not eaten all in a gulp.

Toothless tenses with interest, breathing in the scent all around the remains of the kill and crooning _approval_. His nose is not so keen as some, but the scents are familiar.

They are still going the right way.

They are going a familiar way, too, Toothless realizes as they take off after the trail again. _Home_ is this way, although it is maybe the long way around, he knows. His sense of direction is entirely instinctive, and he never gets lost.

As the long afternoon wears on, the sun far above flying slowly but still too quick to catch, the sky stays open and quiet and peaceful, and the dragon-pair fly on content. Toothless wonders that there are no other dragons.

Perhaps they have all gone to play with humans. The island where there are maybe-all-right-sometimes _pfikingr,_ and dragons who are friendly, is a not-exhausting flight from where they are, he thinks.

They do not fly scared and racing without turning to follow the wind, knowing where they are going and hurrying to be there as quick as they can, but veering and soaring, letting the strong currents that hide in the air show them which way to go. Toothless trusts to the sky and lets it carry them both on its back, setting his wings to glide and skimming wide-away from shreds of clouds that hide the ocean below. So at first the ice far away off to the side of him seems only another cloud, grounded and left behind by the wind that has dropped it like a bone stripped bare and cracked open and not even good to chew anymore.

But when that wind stops to rest a moment, the echoes of sound and a familiar but _not-liked_ smell drift across the waves, and Toothless backwings, the signals of his body that said _steady flying together content good searching_ becoming at once _don’t-like listening attention attention worry careful danger threat-maybe worry!_

Hiccup whistles questions back to him, small sounds of _you?_ and _what?_ and _danger-questioning where?_ Toothless growls and shows _listen!_ with his ear-flaps up and turned ahead.

It is not a cloud, Toothless sees as he edges closer to it, flying high and far away and wary. It is ice, tall and biting like a single fractured fang jutting from an empty broken-apart skull, much-worn but still sharp. It catches clouds and they tear themselves open against it, and their elusive bodies float down to the ocean to fade away and die and disappear.

It is like a mountain all alone in the sea, but Toothless cannot imagine it moaning _lonely_ as icebergs do. It is an iceberg that others would hide from, because it is sharp and biting, and if lonely wandering icebergs fought against it then it would bite them deeply and send them away howling.

Toothless is not an iceberg. He is fire inside and he is never, never lonely. But he too wants to turn and flee from it.

He does not fear its biting. But echoing from its sides are sounds that make him bristle and snarl and tense to fly quick and fleeing. The rattling and jangling of metal and the lapping of water against hollow bellies and the discordant chattering cries of jumbled-together sounds are sounds too well known. They are _pfikingr_ sounds, _human_ sounds, and even from the sky Toothless recognizes _anger_ mixed in among them.

_Anger_ in a human voice is a sound Toothless knows well. _Pfikingr_ are almost always angry at dragons for being where they want to be, or putting their noses into things _pfikingr_ have gathered together and hidden, or hunting for food when dragons are hungry, or taking things because they are interesting, or making things be on fire because they are _better_ on fire.

They get very, very angry when dragons follow careful and sneaking in their pawsteps, and take apart the traps they have set to bite or snatch or bind when humans are not looking.

Small fires flicker in the shadows, and Toothless circles to find the sun and put his tail to it so that they will be hidden from the many ships that float and heave and butt against the unyielding ice, bound to it by ropes and reaching out legs of flat wood to make a path.

On his shoulders, Hiccup flinches away, whining _fear don’t-like stay-away small us danger no careful worry fly-away no no!_

Toothless snorts _agreement_ , rolling his eyes in disdain and dislike, twisting and licking at his jaws as if to spit away the taste of rot. He recoils, reluctant to go any closer now that they have seen that this is not a safe place to be. In the sky they are safe probably, but if they are seen then either there will be very much screaming and running, or humans will shoot biting arrows and stones-that-fly and tangling nets and whipping chains and many hurting things at them.

But they are very high still, and Toothless is not afraid to hover as he eyes the ice as if it were an enemy, watching for where humans are. His wings know where biting arrows cannot reach. The presence of humans when the dragon-pair were thinking only of dragons is unsettling but for now they are safe.

Still, Toothless is very rarely pleased to cross the path of humans. As one of the flock of the far north, he was taught as a hatchling that humans and dragons are enemies, that dragons should fly away from humans quickly because humans are small and they do not fly and they do not breathe fire or spit poison, but they _bite_.

That he ran at the heels of a human woman and slept curled up against her and clamored to be petted and talked to and cared for and loved by her did not matter; she was _mother-of-ours._ Hiccup uses the sound _Aka_ now, and the half-remembered sound _mama_ , now that they both remember her a bit again. She was something different, not _pfikingr-enemy_ reeking of metal and fur and fear-stink and anger, but _mother-of-ours_ with her scent all safe-warm and her signals singing always of _love_.

And both children of _Aka-mama-mother-of-ours_ learned the same things from her living, that puzzles can be thought about and solved, and that traps can be broken, and that things that are can be _different_. And from her dying both learned that humans were once-and-for-all and for always the enemy.

And again and again and again Toothless learned that this was a true thing, in biting arrows and hating screams and throwing stones and slashing sharp-things, from traps that catch and kill and poison-lures cast aside that stink inside and are _not-to-eat_ even when dragons are very hungry in deep winter. And they tell _lies_ , and they try to tear apart _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ who are two-who-are-one, and they bind dragons in chains and cover them in metal and set them against their own kind.

Toothless would be quite happy to stay away from humans always, although he understands that Hiccup likes to steal from them when he can do so without being seen. Humans made his mother and his Hiccup-self long ago, but Toothless needs nothing else from them.

He knows that there are some humans, a very few, who are not threats, who have chosen to not fight with dragons anymore and who can live with them as friends. That is a good thing but a strange one. He will admit, reluctantly, that humans can help them get out of trouble – but only from trouble that _other_ humans put them in to begin with!

So as faint sounds of angry shouting and strange shrieking echo from a deep cave in the ice – it is deep blue inside its throat even in the sun – Toothless’ first instinct is to turn around and fly away, and he tenses as if to spring, snorting _don’t-like_ and _danger!_ even as he casts about for the wind that raced off as the dragon-pair stopped and circled and shuddered.

_Wait!_ Hiccup yelps, claws tightening on Toothless’ shoulders, and the black dragon uncoils all at once, snapping from _ready-to-flee_ to hovering still.

Hiccup- _heart-beloved_ whimpers deep in his throat, shifting his weight and signaling _uneasy_ as he thinks. _Searching,_ he says, overtones in his voice saying _worried_ and _reluctant_ and _determined_ , like paws stepping gingerly through deep and sticky mud hoping there might be clear water on the other side, but not knowing. _Here maybe dragon-kin here perhaps don’t-know not-sure_ …

And _pfikingr!_ he snorts. _Danger! us hunt careful worry maybe danger dragon-kin us-flock_. He clicks an imitation of clattering, snapping metal and leans forward over Toothless’ head to wave one bare paw before his eyes.

The trail does lead this way, and always to ice, and here is ice, Toothless tracks his thinking. And if the hatchlings are threatened by humans, or caught, then _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ are trap-breakers, and undoing what humans have done to their flock-mates was their hunt long before they led others to new islands.

There is a wisp of _reluctance_ like half-seen smoke in Hiccup’s voice, and Toothless hurts with him. The last time they thought themselves very clever breakers of traps and challengers of humans, things worse than _anything_ happened because they leapt into a battle bigger than them against an enemy they did not know how to fight.

When Toothless whines _alarm_ it is not all at the thought of being near humans again, although that is not a thing he likes. But the _fear_ hidden in the signals of his Hiccup-beloved is worse, and Toothless will not let him shy away and hide.

_Determination yes us go careful-sneaking stubborn not-afraid confident hunting us yes good brave,_ Toothless says, glancing over his shoulder and meeting Hiccup’s eyes to say _reassurance_ and _love-you_. He signals _careful looking searching go c’mon quiet sneaking together_ , and he folds his wings and dives.

* * *

_Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ will quarrel with humans if they must, but for now they do not even know if there is anything to fight over. So they slink across the jagged-fang iceberg careful and slow and quiet, keeping low and staying together and raising their heads to look over high boulders of ice and the peaks of sharp cliffs only in brief glimpses. When they call out _here? where? calling!_ and the sound that means their flock and is all of them at once, even that is quick and quiet, and Toothless sidles away to a new place almost as soon as the small echoes have faded away.

Hiccup does not try to climb down from Toothless’ shoulders here. All his claws are ready to fight again, and he hunches his own narrow shoulders. He hides his eyes a bit in the shadows of his scale-skins as the dragon-pair listen for fires and human scents and human sounds, and even more for the familiar sounds of hatchling voices and tracks in snow.

There is very much up and down on this iceberg, and they find no humans on the slopes and cliffs of it. Once, though, human shouting sounds very close, and the dragon-pair leap away frightened. They are puzzled when there is no human standing out on the open, and when Toothless hesitantly lands again he tracks the sound to a deep crevasse in the ice. He stares at it, baffled, tipping his head to one side to look at it again anew. The ice has humans in it!

That is strange.

There are many deep falling-away places in the ice, and caves that swallow the sun and become tunnels. That is another thing that is not like the other icebergs they searched across before. Toothless climbs all the way to the peak of the ice where clouds tear themselves open drifting and helpless, and perched there they can see almost all of the iceberg below. The black dragon imagines that it hums _waiting_ and not _lonely_ with the winds that drive clouds to be bitten, with its hidden humans kept secret in its heart.

He knows they must search the tunnels that run away inside and dive deep below. Caves are good hiding places for dragons and warmer even if they are caves of ice, and if the missing ones have come here, they will not stay out in the open when there are humans about.

There is a wide-open cave mouth far below where the ships are, but _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ turn away from it. Instead they find a ledge that hides a crack in the ice that becomes a tunnel, and Toothless flattens himself to the ice and slinks into the deep blue darkness, shouldering aside small ferns all of ice and coiling around biting ice teeth.

The ice is dark inside, but at first some light trickles in through the many thin cracks that lead to the open air. They are not afraid of this darkness, and they are not afraid to be in tight caves that close in all around, as long as they can get back out again. Both black dragon and dragon-man remember their route deep into the ice instinctively, ready to retrace their steps and flee if needed. As he climbs over a chunk of ice hiding a stone that the iceberg has eaten and buried inside itself, Toothless sings _looking_ sounds at the cave ahead and all around. On his shoulders, Hiccup stays low and close to the warmth of the bigger dragon’s heart-fire, listening too.

Hiccup can barely hear the _looking_ sounds, Toothless knows, but he cannot learn from them as his Toothless-self can. They cannot do all things the same. So Hiccup- _heart-of-mine_ calls softly for the hatchlings as Toothless guides their searching, working together as a seamless team.

The passage twists and Toothless scrambles to keep his footing as it slopes away beneath his paws and then goes sideways. He digs his claws in and stops short, and the small stones and broken pieces of ice dislodged by his scratching clatter past him and bounce out into a larger space beyond.

Cautiously, moving one paw at a time, Toothless creeps forward down the slope and puts his nose into the open space below.

The smell of humans wafts through it, tar-sticky tame fire and rank furs and the strange salt-meat stink of human flesh. When he lowers his head a little further to see out of the hole at his paws, he sees that it is a wide-open tunnel, and that he – and Hiccup, who has sprawled over Toothless’ head to see too so that his weight rests between Toothless’ eyes – is looking into it as if they were a furry water prey-beast come to a hole in the sea ice to breathe after much swimming. Except that those holes are in the ground, and the dragon-pair are above the tunnel.

But it is _like_ that.

There are no humans in the tunnel now, though, so _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ move out into the larger space. Many human pawprints track through the broken-apart ice like snow across the ground, and Toothless growls _don’t-like_ at his own pawprints left behind.

Hiccup taps his shoulder for attention, and when his dragon-companion turns an eye to him, he gestures to Toothless’ tail and brushes a paw from side to side across Toothless’ skull.

Oh. Toothless would not have thought of that. He purrs _love-you_ and _gratitude_ very strongly to his clever beloved-one and waves his tail across the prints to smudge them away as they go.

His tail is far away from his heart-fires, and it gets very cold as they go on and it trails through very much snow. There are so many tunnels. Many are wide and open and easy to walk through even if there are broken pieces of ice with sharp new edges all around. Those tunnels are wide around their wings and high enough above their backs to fly through, if they were quick and careful and agile and with not even a single wing-beat clumsy at all.

Others are too small for even littler dragons like _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ to climb into, dark and secret and closed-in. Toothless will not let Hiccup go into those alone, even though hatchlings could have gone there even though the dragon-pair cannot.

And the hatchlings have been here, Toothless knows. The scent of familiar flock-kin dragons is brushed against broken-off ice fangs and melted-away corners. Small paw-tracks walking all across each other blur together and disappear when the ice lies clear and hard again. Fresh strong-reeking spoor under crushed snow, kicked over the mess carelessly, marks a place where the hatchlings have rested and moved on.

But they grow more and more nervous as the hatchlings do not appear in response to their calls, and instead they find more and more traces of humans. Humans have crawled through this iceberg like ants, it seems, which is strange, as neither of them can figure out why humans might be interested in ice.

Many passages open again into a vast and sprawling broad space that smells very large like a good cave for dragons to nest in, big enough to fly and play in, but they can hear clearly that the cave has many humans in it. There is very much shouting, and the striking of metal against ice rings loud and jarring, familiar to _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ from times when Hiccup has turned his sharp-claw blade against ice.

A single stolen look is enough for both dragons to know that it is a cave they do not want to go into, even if they could fly through it rather than creeping and squirming through small cold tunnels. There are far too many humans there for comfort. Even if they knew and trusted these humans, there would be too many humans, and they do not know these humans at all.

The _pfikingr_ swing sharp things against the ice, and set fires to burn against it. They have horns like the prey-beasts humans keep for their own, and they shout and call out to each other as they dig as if making a cave to nest in.

_Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ do not like at all the shrieking chattering noise that one of the humans makes as it paces around. The _pfikingr_ waves its front paws and claps them to its head where there are no horns, yowling as if frustrated and hurting and outraged. It moves and snarls and snaps at its flock-mates as if it were the Alpha of them, swatting at them with sounds and brandishing its paws to strike. It shrieks and threatens as if it would bite even though humans are not good at biting.

Its strangeness following close on the tail of the deep strangeness of humans digging into ice chases the two-who-are-one away, back to their own searching.

The missing hatchlings are not in the cave, and that is good enough.

Toothless has only just stepped out into the trodden-down snow of one of the wide tunnels again when the sound of human voices startles him, and he leaps back into the more hidden passage without hesitation. Its mouth is hidden by broken pieces and shattered ice and the dragon-pair huddle and stay quiet and still and pretend to be a shadow as the light of flickering fires grows brighter and the voices louder.

Two humans stagger through the tunnel, down from the open air. They are weighed down by many heavy things, and they growl and grumble to each other about it.

A snarl flares to life in Toothless’ throat, and he snaps his fangs out to hold it there. It emerges only as a furious tremor that thrums through all his muscles, and his back legs tense to pounce and his claws to strike and tear, silent signals howling _anger recognition anger anger fear hatred bad bad bad anger!_ at the sight.

The things the humans are carrying are strong chains and chain-nets and biting catching hooks. Toothless recognizes leather straps that bind and the sullen sound of ropes that have metal inside when they burn.

On his shoulders, Hiccup hisses very softly _fury_ , tense with the same _recognition_. They know and despise the tools and the weapons of humans trying to catch and trap dragons. These things are their enemy and their prey.

_Worry lost danger here lost dragon-cousins small scared here? here? us go looking urgent-hurry anxious c’mon!_ Hiccup chirps and croons and yowls when the humans have disappeared and only the last traces of their tame fires can be seen.

Toothless shudders with him, bone-deep _anxiety_ and _fear_ reflecting back and forth between them, nipping at both and feeding on them to grow strong. Now he is afraid for the missing ones for real, and the game of flying far alone-together again and playing at searching is truly over.

* * *

The sounds she most often hears for herself mean _come-here!_ and _stop-that!_ but she thinks of herself as a mixture of _bravest_ and _boldest_ and _most important_ and _fiercest_ and _cleverest_ , so she is Best inside and one day her sounds that are all her own will be soft whistles and shy glances all turned to her.

She wants very much to curl up small and coil her tail around herself and hide but the eyes of her friends are turned to her. So she must keep her shoulders up and her wings half-spread as if to fly although she does not know where to fly that might not be ice.

They are huddled together in a hollow beneath a ledge that they found only because Bumble fell into it and disappeared. Squirrel yelped and startled as she does and sat and whimpered. Best snorted at her and shoved her away and crept down the slope with her claws that are too long for her small feet digging into the ice.

It is a good cave for them and they know all its corners now except the ones that melted under the warmth of them all. But Tagalong watches her waiting for Best to do something else clever now, and Best does not know what to do.

She has had many ideas and she is tired of ideas now! It is someone else’s turn!

_Going home_ was her idea and it was a good idea when they were playing all by themselves, sulking and growling at the stones with no ice _at all,_ and shrieking _disappointment_ with caves that were small and not deep and wandering and endless, and yowling _lonely_ a bit that there is not even the shadow of the king like a scent that cannot be tracked but disappears, blown away. Best imagined once that she could _almost_ track it, almost hear him, almost sense the voice inside that her mother and her mother’s mate and all the bigger dragons listen to and obey, but now she is far away off its trail.

_C’mon,_ she hissed then, nosing at Squirrel who is like her a bit, who likes to play in fire and whose scales do not scorch even when she tries to spin and blaze and only makes fire blow everywhere. It was a _playing_ thing to pretend. Best strutted and purred and led her friend and then Tagalong as well across the island again and again, as if _she_ were like Maker-and-Faraway who go away and come back again. Best wants to be like Maker-and-Faraway very much because all eyes turn to them and when they speak dragons listen and where they go dragons follow.

But soon they tired of that game, and Tagalong whimpered _home? home? where? sad me small angry! you us flying hoping yes go?_ and looked at Best with big eyes.

Best snarled at her and licked at her purple-blotched sides and made them _mostly_ flames, and Tagalong crouched and wailed and ran away to whine to Bumble. And when Best and Bumble were tired of snapping and leaping at each other and had chased each other shrieking across many big dragons in their new nests, Bumble waved his thick clumsy tail and tipped his head a bit – it rolled _all_ of him almost – and wondered _me too?_

It was good that they looked at her waiting and hopeful. Best liked that very much and she puffed her chest up _pleased_ until her friends began to click _excitement_ and _impatience._

So Best flew around and around and out to sea a bit, and she remembered coming to the new _wrong not-home_ island. And then she folded her wings around her and tumbled down, and when she landed she spun around chasing her tail and looked _back_. And that was how she knew the way to go so they would not look away from her and grumble _disappointment_.

Sneaking careful and flying without being seen was a good game. Finding new ice that felt a bit like home was a good game. Finding _caves_ was a good game.

Caves she does not know are not a good game. It is stupid ice. It melts and flows and changes and now Best does not know where to go or where the sun is.

And it is full of terrible strange loud sounds that shudder through the ice under their paws and their bellies, and all the air that moves – so there must be open sky that way, Best knows instinctively – stinks of scents that mean _no bad danger avoid run-away no-play this bad danger fear no no!_

Now she holds herself very still so she does not cringe back against her friends, away from the harsh abrupt sounds that must be _human_ sounds.

The humans seem to be everywhere except their hiding place, and Best is afraid. Her playing that became real has become a terrifying thing.

Dead reeking furs and rattling bright hard sharp stones and old withered hides not even good to eat anymore could be shrieked at and run away from, and then she was purred over and licked and praised. Those things did not move when she growled and blazed at them. They did not follow her!

But there was nowhere Best could lead her friends that humans did not go, and now they are hiding under a ledge too afraid to move.

She does not feel very Best now.

Best cowers away from their sounds and scents and half-glimpsed shapes as they stalk through the ice tunnels, and the memories they track into her skull like mud. She remembers the day the nest was most afraid of all. All the stones shook, and outside the caves where Best huddled with her friends she heard ice shattering but louder than anything. And the dragons who had always been big and fearless howled in shuddering, shrieking fear.

She remembers hiding deep below where she had never been, dark and unfamiliar and strange. She stumbled over learning that the caves that were _home_ were bigger than she ever knew even as those caves crumbled around her and shifted away from her paws.

It was stranger even than climbing over the idea that the _world_ was so much bigger, that there was an outside beyond the nest, because she had seen always dragons flying in and out and going away and coming back. When Maker-and-Faraway flew away they were gone a very long time and she almost forgot them. But then they came back and Best realized that they must have flown _very_ far because she remembered Faraway flying faster than everyone and Maker-and-Faraway are always together.

And there was a new scent on the edge of things, one she could not quite sense clearly. It was not distant and reassuring and familiar but _desperate_ and _hungry_ and _striking_ , and that was the strangest wrongness of all.

Best remembers the _fear-rage-hate-hurting-desperate-panic-terror_ roaring of her family and her flock-mates, echoing back through the shuddering deep caves, and the small frightened whimpers of her friends all around.

She had not understood, but only known that she was afraid.

Afterwards she had learned that _humans_ had attacked their home, and dragons too but the dragons had rolled over and shown their bellies and crouched _no-fight_. But _humans_ had brought them there.

So Best is very afraid of humans, even though she has never seen one herself before.

She does not want to see them now. She wants them all to go away and for the stupid ice to move and open and let them all leave. She thought it was good ice because it smelled like home, but it is not.

There are many small places and deep shadows inside the ice so they have hidden together almost under the noses of the humans. Best knows she must be bravest of all – she is _Best –_ so she peeks out at them very carefully since she cannot run away. They stalk on their hind legs like Tagalong will do when she is grown and her tail-spikes are sharp, and like Tall Watcher does back home in their own caves where they should be, and like Maker does sometimes. Even Squirrel stayed still while the humans shouted to each other. And Bumble hummed along with the shuddering in the ice even as he cowered into the puddle that his blazing rock-fires inside made beneath his belly.

Best has only a single idea to hover over and hoard and guard like her mother does over her, and that is hiding, all of them together because they must be a flock and protect each other and be very brave. That is what flocks do.

This is not a fun game anymore, but she will be the Best she can until they do not have to play it anymore.

Claws stab against her sides, and Best lifts her head from where she has rested her long jaw against the ice. She rolls one eye towards Squirrel who has nudged her with her wing-claws.

_There?_ Squirrel asks only with looking at the bigger tunnel beyond their hiding place, her body saying _yes maybe hopeful please yes afraid don’t-want don’t-like want-to-run small small_.

Crouched where she wriggled in between Best on one side and her favorite Bumble on the other, Tagalong clicks very softly _hopeful scared-though please quick yes us go!_

Best snaps her fangs close to Tagalong’s heavy nose. _Hush!_ she commands as if she were a mother, warning. _Danger!_

There are no more sounds or shapes of humans in the tunnel. There is some ice between their hiding place and the tunnel, but Best could see their shadows when they were there. And their scents are fading, although the lesson to turn away from smells like that is still strong.

But Best is scared. At least this hollow is hidden and no humans have come here. Even if they did, she and her friends could stay small and still in the shadows under the ledge. Out there is open and exposed like being alone in a meadow with others sneaking up to play ambush-and-pounce games, even if the tunnel is not _proper_ wide and open like the bright sky with clouds to hide behind and islands to race to. Best would be glad of even the not-home island.

She does not even want her friends looking to her now, and she stays very still as she thinks and whimpers inside, because if she moves she will tremble and then she will not be Best at all.

Something dark drops from the ledge above, winding itself around the hiding place and blocking out even the faint distant light, and all Best’s fears escape as a sudden shriek of _terror_.

Her voice is almost drowned out by the matching screams from her friends as they recoil and scrape their claws against the ice at their tails as if trying to dig their way out, flailing blindly in panic.

_You!_ a familiar voice huffs, sharp edges of _frustration_ and _worry_ and _irritation_ in it.

Best flinches and looks up, but her nose has already shown her who has come to find them.

Faraway steps back only a pace, enough to let a little light sneak around him and flash from his bright green eyes. They are almost all Best can see, because the rest of him is as dark as the inside of eyes, except for Maker who is with him always and part of him anyway. _You scolding silly-silly-silly you small what? what? here why don’t-know small_ , he huffs. A small noise is his tail slapping against ice as he lashes it in _exasperation_ , but Best does not want to pounce on it.

From his shoulders Maker warns _careful quiet down still hush us careful worry worry worry tense nervous_ , head raised and looking away. Quick as flames he crouches to see the hatchlings in their scratched-up, melted-away hiding place and his signals say _relief you here happy good yes laughter-maybe_ , but then he is alert and watchful again.

It would be a very good thing if the hiding place would melt and be a lake, and then Best could wade into it and put her head underwater and not be seen ever. Being lost and not knowing what to do was better than being found trapped and stupid by Maker-and-Faraway. She burns all over with embarrassment and shame, as her tail tucks low and her shoulders slump and her wings pull in to make her as small as she can be, knowing with all her body that she will never blaze all over confident and sure ever again.

And her _friends_ have seen! They are turning away from the torn-up ice and running to twine around Faraway’s paws to hide beneath his body, and rearing up to nudge their noses against Maker to be petted and scratched and reassured. All their signals say _happy happy good happy relief so-scared us you pity-us us small you here you good here you here yes yes good!_

Best wishes that anyone but Maker-and-Faraway had come to find them. She admires them very greatly. There are no other dragons like them, when at home there were many small fire-skin hatchlings like Best. _Everyone_ in the nest knows who they are because they are so different. Maker can do strange-but-wonderful things with his paws and Faraway is fastest of all, and together they have clever and baffling-different thoughts of new games and new tricks and things that _might_ be. They make shapes and shadows to be looked at, and they tell stories when they come home from flying far away.

Maker smells a bit like humans but mostly like dragons, and most of all like Faraway who smells of the flock, and anyway there are many dragons in the nest who smell a bit like humans now.

They have sounds of their own that sound like _tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ or sometimes _(click)-phuh_ that means Maker and _tt-th-ss_ that means Faraway, and it is not at all their fault that Best was taken to a new place that she did not like, that does not even have any ice like home or a king to watch over them.

She wants to be a brave wanderer and a leader too just like them.

So she cringes and drags the tips of her wings and stares at the ice beneath her too-long claws, that they should find her helpless and come to rescue her.

_Hurting?_ a soft croon asks, and Best looks up to see Maker crouched to see under the ledge where she is still hiding. He ducks his shoulders and reaches a paw out, pleading _c’mon you come-here safe reassuring comfort you friendly c’mon calling_.

She is not hurting outside to be cared for and fixed, but she stretches out her neck to brush her jaw against the backs of his claws pitifully.

The touch reassures, and she follows the paw when he pulls it back, luring her out into Faraway’s shadow where her friends are gathered and purring as the black dragon noses at them and tastes their scales and checks them all over for new hurts.

_Sorry!_ Best whimpers. She cannot snap at it quick enough to swallow it again as it flies from her.

Maker huffs at her but it is a _hough hough hough_ of laughter and not so much of scolding. _Silly_ , he says, petting between her horns, shaking her gently. _You here safe good not-mad us flock worry here why curious confusion curious strange._ There is a _bit_ of scolding in his voice, and more in Faraway’s as he puts his head over Maker’s shoulder and snarls but with no teeth.

_Danger!_ Faraway reminds them all in a soft yelp. Now he looks away towards the wide tunnel while Maker reaches out to Bumble and Tagalong and Squirrel. Maker-and-Faraway are like that. They are like a two-heads dragon/s that has fallen apart like pieces of an egg.

Tagalong opens her jaw to shriek _happy_ and Maker taps her and hisses _no!_ and _hush!_ He rears up and puts his front paws on Faraway’s shoulders, watching where Faraway watches.

Light flickers across the ice, moving like flying, and the threatening jangling sound quiets Best and her friends more quickly than any command of _hush!_

Faraway crouches low and spreads his wings, and all of them scuttle underneath into that darkness, except for Maker, who drops back to all his paws and moves to Faraway’s shoulder. From beneath Faraway’s wing, Best can see him raise his claws and tense to leap, both of them defensive and ready.

But the humans and their fires and their strange sounds go away again.

_Enough_ , Maker snarls, leaping to Faraway’s back and settling there. And he cries very softly _let’s go!_

Best knows that the eyes of her friends are turned away from her now, that they will look to Maker-and-Faraway as their small flock pads careful and alert into the twisting paths through the ice. But she raises her jaw anyway and licks at her scales so they will blaze if humans find them, determined to not be only _silly_ to her friends and to Maker-and-Faraway, and follows close as they go together to find the sun and the open sky.

* * *

_To be continued._


	3. The Interior

**_Flashfreeze,_ ** **Part Three: The Interior**

It’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

Even when it was just a shadow in the ice it was awesome, because _finally_ he’d actually found it! It was real!

He wants it a lot.

…well, _someone_ had found it, but Dagur was the only one with the sheer brilliance to think of looking for it at all, so it was basically the same thing.

And now it’s here!

And so is he.

“What’s taking so long?” Dagur demands, trying to get a grip on his red hair before remembering that he’d cut it all short after he’d torn out a handful by accident.

It’s not his fault he has so many muscles. Oh wait. It is.

Instead he presses his hands against his head as if it might explode if he let go – he’s so excited that it might, it really might – and glares at anyone stupid enough to turn away and look at him. “What are _you_ looking at?” he accuses the nearest man.

The man hurriedly gets back to hacking at the ice with a pick. Ye _gods_. No one has any _spirit_.

“Not so hard!” he snaps. “If you hurt it, I’ll _feed_ you to it! Hmm,” he breaks off to wonder, forgetting about the man. “There’s a thought. What _am_ I going to feed my lovely, legendary, glorious, _real_ Skrill when it’s finally all mine? There’s nothing to hunt on this godsforsaken iceberg. I haven’t gotten to shoot anything all day.”

There’d been quite a lot of chaos when he’d fired some crossbow bolts at the walls of this ice cave.

Dagur is usually all for chaos, but when his Berserkers are cringing and lying on the floor and screaming like the cowards they are, afraid of a few ricocheting razor-sharp bolts, they’re not digging out his Skrill, and Dagur wants his Skrill!

Is that so hard to understand?

Instead he taps his fingers against the stock of his favorite crossbow and stares covetously at the shadow in the ice, slowly emerging as ice falls away with every ringing strike. It’s driving him _mad_ , waiting. He wants to shove them all aside and grab their picks and tear through the ice like a godsdamn Whispering Death and set it free right now. He’s thought about running up to it and just plastering himself against the ice to be as close as possible to the epically powerful, totally awesome lightning-spitting dragon he’s heard stories about all his life. The only thing – so far – that’s stopped him from doing so is knowing that it would just melt all over him and make him look wet and stupid.

“Hello, beautiful,” he says to the imprisoned dragon, grinning, and licks at his lips just to make sure he’s not actually drooling over it. “You are going to be _so awesome!_ ”

All around him, Berserkers chip at the walls with ice axes and picks. Only a dark blur had been visible, when whoever it was who’d had the initiative to go this deep into yet another iceberg had found it. Dagur really must figure out who that was and keep a careful eye on him. He doesn’t like clever people, not close up. Dagur prefers it when he’s the cleverest person in the room or, preferably, on the island.

A couple of lazy shirkers are hiding behind the piles of dragon-catching stuff they hauled in here, enough to capture a dozen dragons, probably. He’s got nets, chains, hooks, ropes, flares, spears, axes, swords, more ropes, and possibly even a keg of ale under all that. (Dagur isn’t _totally_ convinced that last is actually for the dragon.) Abandoned on top of it all are some cobbled-together muzzles made to fit the tanner’s best guess at the shape of a Skrill’s jaw. The man insisted that just because he’d seen it on their sails all his life didn’t mean he knew exactly what it looks like. But _Dagur_ will know it when he sees it properly. How could he not?

He’s about to yell at them, but then he’s distracted by another patrol returns from exploring the tunnels that turn this iceberg into a maze. All that whining about being in this cave, and they weren’t happy about going out there either. Nothing makes idiots happy.

“Well?” he demands of the trio. “Anyone out there?”

The tallest, holding his hands over the flame of the nearest torch, looks at him reproachfully. “No, sir,” he says. “No one knows we’re here. I really don’t think –”

Dagur picks up the nearest piece of ice and wings it at him. The man ducks and it shatters against the wall behind him, showering all three of them with a miniature hailstorm. “You’re not here to think!” Dagur screams at him. “It’s not your job to think! I do the thinking! And I think once word gets out, everyone in the Archipelago is going to want to steal my Skrill! We’ll do all the work and those _idiots_ on Berk with their _bloody_ tame dragons are going to swoop in and try to take it away!”

The thought of Berk and its insufferable Berkians heats his blood back up again – warm coats are for _wimps_ who just can’t work up a decent rage – and Dagur throws another piece of ice at the wall, wishing that it was Berk bursting apart and disappearing. Or that there was someone here to throw it at. Preferably that jumped-up little minx Astrid. Or her pet Nadder. Or any of Berk’s pet dragons.

Dagur can’t bear to be upstaged. Even when his useless lump of a father was chief – such a waste of time, the man was _utterly_ lacking in imagination – his son had always been the center of attention. He’d always been the loudest, the strongest, the cleverest, the bravest, the fiercest – and anyone who thought otherwise quickly learned that more than anything else, Dagur could always be the _meanest_.

One way or another, he always won. If he had to cheat or bully his way to victory, or just plain ignore anyone trying to prove him wrong, then that was still winning.

And he’s _got_ to be the craziest.

He can’t imagine how boring everyone else’s world must be. They should be grateful he tries so hard to make it that much more interesting. They all owe him, really. He works at making their lives more than just the endless dull _drudgery_ of boring stuff like crops and sheep and digging wells and…whatever else normal people do all day, and what kind of thanks does he get?

Anyway, if he shouts loud enough, no one will get in his way. And then he can do things that might be fun, or that will keep his minions too busy to start asking awkward questions, like “Why are we doing this?”

Dagur hates that question. But he’s got a really good answer: throwing smart-mouthed people overboard. Works _great_.

“I had a perfectly good chance to go out raiding, now that there haven’t been any dragon attacks for a while,” he justifies to himself. “Tame dragons are _cheating_!”

Since someone else had thought of it first, at least.

“How dare they?” Dagur asks of no one in particular. “How dare they be crazier than _me?_ I’ll show them! Look at _this_ , Astrid! You play around with your little dragons. I’ve got a _Skrill!_ ”

He’s going to get himself a Skrill, and then he’s going to be the one laughing. How hard can it be, anyway, if _Astrid_ can do it?

He laughs. Dagur likes laughing. A lot.

Other people don’t seem to like it. He likes that too. So he laughs some more.

He can do better than Berk’s dopey common dumb beasts. Only some ice stands between him and _better_ , as he shoves aside his minions for another closer look.

A little more of the ice has melted away, and what was only a silhouette is a little clearer now. Its eyes are frozen open, bright and fierce like poisoned gold, and its wings are spread. He thinks its jaw might be open in a scream or a roar, teeth showing as lighter points in the dark maw.

“Look at that snarl!” he almost sighs. Sighs are for weak people, but this almost justifies one. “My Skrill is a fighter! It didn’t just lie down and give up and get buried! Something must have trapped it here!”

He can’t imagine what, but that doesn’t matter. An avalanche? A _battle_? If so, Dagur wants that dragon too. An ice-blasting warrior dragon. Neat! Except they’d probably fight. Although that would be pretty awesome too.

All his life, he’s heard stories about the legendary Skrill. Sometimes the legends were about its power to control lightning. They said it was the deadliest and most ruthless beast ever seen in the Archipelago, except maybe for a Night Fury, but there’s never been one of _those_ around here, and Dagur doesn’t think they really exist. And sometimes the stories were about its fate, that it was somewhere out there, frozen in ice, waiting to be found. There were stories about quests to find the Skrill, and the many (mostly terrible) things that happened to the warriors who went looking.

But nothing was worse than the endings. All the warriors in the stories got sidetracked, had adventures, battled gods, got blown to the ends of the earth, and so on, and so forth – _boring!_ What about the _Skrill?_

None of the stories talked about it being found. Heroes in stories were stupid. How could they get distracted from something as awesome as a Skrill?

He could do better than _that._ Even if his father had insisted, over and over, that they had enough dragon problems without going looking for one more.

But then his boring, softhearted, absolute _pushover_ of a father had vanished, leaving his son in command of the Berserkers, and Dagur had laughed in satisfaction and set out to show everyone that while _Oswald_ the bloody _Agreeable_ had been no Berserker at all, his _son_ had all the fire in his belly that the father had lacked.

And then the dragon raids that had kept his tribe pinned down on their island, as fun as those fights had been, had stopped.

And then he’d taken his fleet to Berk, and _tame_ dragons had boxed their ears and sent them away, while the beasts’ masters laughed.

It was the perfect time to go Skrill hunting.

“It’s destiny! The symbol of our tribe, just waiting to be found. It’s going to be so glad to get out! Maybe I won’t have to feed any of you lot to it after all.”

Most of the minions flinch as they lean on their picks and axes and stay out of his way. People are so gullible. Dagur laughs some more.

“Well? What are you all standing around for! Get it out!”

They get back to work at once, and Dagur stalks away feeling like he’s done his bit to keep them motivated. He prowls the ice cave keeping a wary eye out for spies and saboteurs and enemies and people gossiping behind his back about him being paranoid.

He knows there’s someone else here. Or something else. He’s heard them. Strange sounds deeper within the ice, or down the tunnels, or yowling distantly far above, all around, flitting from place to place like ghosts. Faint sounds, certainly, but Dagur is a hunter. He knows how to listen for sounds that don’t belong and the small signs of something hiding from him. Some time ago, while the diggers were taking a rest, right before he shouted at them for being lazy and then turned that shift out to go patrol while shoving tools into the hands of the patrollers and commanding them to take over, he saw a brief shower of ice tumble from one of the cracks up towards the high roof of the cave.

There had been no one up there to dislodge it, and there was no digging going on at the time – the minions were still sorting themselves out. So there has to be someone else here.

Dagur’s going to find them and shoot them. He wants to shoot something.

The torches that light the cave are always flickering, but an extra movement catches his eye, up near one of those cracks. For just a moment, a shadow is cast across the ice.

“I see you,” Dagur singsongs to himself, grinning again, his mood changing as quickly as the light. “Think you’re clever, huh?”

He raises his crossbow and sights along it as the shadow – it’s long and heavy-headed and has horns, and he thinks it might be a dragon – grows and spreads and loses all shape. If he can just make the shot…

The angle is wrong, and Dagur lowers the bow again and scowls.

He just needs a better angle.

“Aha!” he shouts to himself, as his eyes fall on one of the many chunks of ice jutting from the walls. Slinging his weapon over his shoulder, he runs to the lump of ice against the opposite wall, pushing past an unfortunate Berserker who happened to be in his way. “Move!”

Dagur draws his two boot knives and leaps as far as he can, stabbing them deep into the ice while his boots scramble for a grip. Finding it, he makes his way up and over the debris. A glance over his shoulder as he climbs shows him that the shadow – it might be _several_ shadows – is still there, changing shape like the surface of a pot of boiling water. And over the racket of metal against ice, and a couple of baffled cries of “Sir?”, there are yipping, yowling noises coming from that dark flaw in the ice.

He’s not quite level with it, but he’s closer than he was. From here he can see that there are an ill-assorted bunch of little dragons crouching in the lip of the crevice, staring down into the cave like oglers at a funeral. As he watches, one of them vanishes backwards into the darkness as if something had yanked it by the tail – it even squeaks faintly. But a different one takes its place.

Dagur lowers his voice to a triumphant hiss. “Gotcha!” He stabs his knife down and wedges one boot against it, leveling his crossbow and taking aim.

Damned if he cares where it ricochets to. He doesn’t plan to miss.

Up this high, the cave is broken and rough, full of cracks and notches and openings, a maze in ice. This iceberg is riddled with cracks and full of corners. Up here, he might as well be in a dark and overgrown forest. Dagur closes one eye as he tracks the overexcited little Nadder – he’s quite taken against Nadders recently – but he still notices when something moves in one of the closer gaps.

The torches below flare up as someone moves them, and Dagur glances away from the small dragons, distracted towards the nearer danger as it coils and twists and hisses threateningly.

The creature is dark in the reflected light from the torches, half-hidden by the ice and indistinct. Still, Dagur can feel it staring at him. He stares back. Whatever it is crouches, poised to leap, and Dagur can hear its scales scrape against the ice as clearly as its snarl. The sound blends into the whistle-shriek of a dragon diving to the attack, and Dagur swivels to point the crossbow at it at once, shouting an incoherent battle-cry.

Before he can get a shot off, it leaps backwards, disappearing into the forest of stalag-whatever-they’re-calleds.

“Wary, are you?” Dagur growls at it. “Oh yeah. You know arrows, huh? Come out and fight!” It’s smaller than he is. He could take it. “Bring it on, ya runty little lizard!”

Nothing moves in the darkness.

“No? Didn’t think so.”

But the moment he starts to turn back towards the little dragons in their niche, Dagur sees movement out of the corner of his eye, and when he looks back, there it is again. He still can’t make out what kind of dragon it is.

It raises a paw and claws at the air, howling.

“Oh, you want me to shoot you? Is that it? Hold still!”

The creature doesn’t hold still, and Dagur’s shot misses, bouncing off the stalag-whatevers and falling away. He keeps losing sight of it as the light flickers.

“Hold the torches still!” Dagur yells down at them, adding “Idiots!” for good measure. “When I get my Skrill, you’re gonna be charcoal,” he warns the dragon.

It shrieks at him and backs away as he slaps another bolt into the firing mechanism and winches the bow to its full draw again. Dagur likes crossbows. They put big holes in things. But they aren’t quick.

By the time he looks up again, it’s gone. Any one of the patches of shadow or pieces of ice could hide it.

“Dumb beast,” Dagur mutters, and then curses viciously. The small dragons are now nowhere to be seen.

He doesn’t have time to get properly mad, though – a shout from below breaks into his fuming.

“Sir! It’s moving!”

“What?” Dagur screams back, rage washed away by excitement. He forgets about the other dragons entirely. “Everyone get away from it! It’s mine!”

He yanks his knife from the ice and leaps carelessly from ledge to ice block, landing on the floor of the cave again in a single enormous jump.

The noise he makes is not at all a scream of delight. “Look at it!” he cries. “Look at it, look at it, isn’t it the most beautiful thing! What am I gonna call it? Deathstrike! No! Thunderbolt! No! Killer! No! All of it! Deathstrike Thunderbolt Killer the Awesome! Yes!”

It’s a bit of a mouthful. He’ll work on that.

Beneath the last, tiny, insignificant sheet of ice, that golden eye blinks, and the pupil shrinks against the light of the torches. Something cracks as the Skrill shifts, as its shoulders heave, as one heavily clawed back paw gathers itself and kicks out. A jaw frozen open begins to close as trickles of lightning crawl across the inside of the ice.

Dagur realizes his mouth is open, too, and closes it. Through clenched teeth, he whispers, “ _Get the chains._ ”

His minions break and run. He half expects them all to make for the tunnel out of here, but instead the clanking of metal tells him that they’re actually doing what they’re told for once. Still, he can’t look away to check on them.

The Skrill spreads its wings, and its head turns away – and then it lashes out, and ice explodes, and it’s _out._

It stumbles, at first, still groggy and disoriented from its long sleep. One of its wings and a back paw are still trapped in the ice, but it’s still the most impressive dragon Dagur has ever seen.

“It’s terrifying!” he shouts, thrilled. “I love it! It’s going to be mine! I must have it!”

Everyone will have to take him seriously now! He can take whatever he wants and do whatever he wants, with this creature obeying him. And it’s his by right, it’s a Berserker dragon, he _deserves_ it!

“Charge!” yells Dagur.

The Skrill does not like being charged at by Berserkers wielding lances and hooked poles. Even that is awesome. He doesn’t want some meek little lapdog of a dragon fawning over him and making nice – he wants a warrior! But Dagur is going to have to teach it who’s boss around here.

That would be him. For the record.

It snaps at the net thrown over its head, links snagging in the spiny ruff protecting the back of its neck, but as it does, Dagur grabs a length of chain off the minion immediately at hand and dives at the nearest back paw. The other one is raised to shake off the last of the ice, so there’s a brief moment when all its weight is on the paw that’s just had a chain wrapped around it. Dagur clicks the clasp home and dodges away before all those claws can lift and tear at him.

“Yes!” he exults, back on his own feet again. “More chains! More nets! Get me the muzzle!”

Enough Berserkers grab hold of the edges of the net to weigh its head down, and Dagur wraps the thick leather around its jaws. The muzzle doesn’t quite fit right, he notices, frustrated, even as he waves at everyone to back away.

The Skrill looks at the chain around its ankle, tracks it to the gang of men, a dozen strong, holding the other end as if their lives depend on it. They do. Its eyes roll, trying to look at the muzzle. It looks at the men with nets and hooks ready. It looks up at the ice above its head, and all around.

Its head swivels around, and its jaws open as far as they can. Lightning crackles between them in the narrow gap.

“Hey, you can’t do that!” Dagur shouts at it. “You need the sky!”

It seems the Skrill hasn’t heard the same stories.

“Uh oh,” he accidentally says out loud.

Everything after that happens in flashes. There’s a lot of running for cover no matter how much Dagur screams at the _cowards_ to hold their ground. There’s enough shouting to deafen a man. Lightning strikes up towards the roof, and shards of ice pour down on them all. There’s the tortured grinding sound of collapsing, shifting, lurching ice. The Skrill rears to its full height, shaking its head in an attempt to get the muzzle off, and roars, a strangled cry of balked rage.

“Come on, come on, come on,” Dagur mutters, hoping no one can hear him. Probably not. They’re all hiding. “Give it up, come to Dagur!”

Flashes of all sorts of colors are going off behind his eyes like he’s been staring at the sun, echoes of the lightning cutting through the dimness of the ice cavern. The place has probably never been so bright. At first, Dagur thinks that the blasts of purplish fire are no different from the blue stars bouncing back from the floor, or the red flares burning through the air, or the jagged white afterimages crisscrossing the cave, or the smoky greenish clouds wafting around.

Dagur knows those lights aren’t real, and he’s mad enough to not care even if they are, so he gathers himself and raises his fists – he seems to have lost his crossbow – and glares through the light show. “Stop that!” he shouts at the beast. “You’re _mine!_ Just _admit it_ already! _”_

But the handful of Berserkers trying to toss a hooked chain around one wing leap back and fall over their own feet as one of those purple blasts strikes against the ice before them. Another flies right past a man with a net, so close that his hair sizzles.

Blinding sparks run up and down the leg chain like a blazing river, and it clatters to the ice as the soldiers snatch their hands back and reel, struck numb and twitching ridiculously.

Another purple-bright fireball bursts against the Skrill’s jaws, and the muzzle falls away, twisted and scorched.

Freed, the Skrill _screams_.

“What’s wrong with you!” Dagur screams back at it. “Why aren’t you doing what I _want?”_

Doesn’t it understand how awesome it’s going to be? But _noooo…_ It’s as useless as everyone else! He comes here to set it loose into glorious battle, and it’s just frightened and desperate.

Maybe it’s confused. “That’s it! You’re just not properly awake yet!”

It shrieks furiously.

Dagur gulps, ears ringing. “Or maybe you are.”

And it wants _out_. Taking off into flight, it casts about, nosing towards one corner of the chamber only to pull away and make for another, twisting and turning and thrashing, making small aborted lunges and sudden retreats. The dangling leg chain rattles against the ice like dancing bones.

In an instant, it makes its choice and its escape, diving for the widest of the tunnels and disappearing.

That tunnel happens to go nowhere near the outside, Dagur knows. It’s about the only thing he _does_ know, for a moment. The world is still all flashes and echoes. Then he remembers the rest of it.

“No!” Dagur screams into the sudden silence at no one in particular. “ _No!_ It’s mine! And you let it get away! All of you are useless! Get up! Move! I’m going after it! _I want that dragon!_ ”

* * *

Hiccup trembles with the ice as it howls and shudders all around. He crouches low to Toothless’ shoulders and hides his face in the nape of his partner-beloved’s neck, wanting to vanish into his skin so that they will be _one_ dragon all mixed up together and safe.

His shaking is from fear as much as cold, as the deep ice shatters away like rain. Perhaps that is the way of things. The lightning has woken the rain. Perhaps the creaking and crying out of the shifting ice will be thunder roaring answer soon and they will be swallowed by a storm they cannot fly from.

Together _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ huddle with the small ones hiding beneath Toothless’ body. The hatchlings are frightened again, remembering _scared-lost-alone_ only now. _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ hissed and snarled at them _no come-here no go you bad no careful danger no stay-back danger here!_ but still they scuttled away to put their paws over the ledge and stare at the strange doings of humans.

_You here,_ said the little fire-spinning one with scales like grass in shadows, jaw gaping in a grin, and her body said _not-afraid_.

And then the shrieking _pfikingr_ Alpha had climbed to hunt them, and _still_ the little ones did not see or care to startle at it. They do not know biting arrows.

It was not a good thought to run alone and howl among the ice to make the _pfikingr_ turn and look away. But Hiccup knows that if _pfikingr_ see his Toothless-self, then they will chase, and the dragon-pair want only to escape from this ice place and fly back to the new nest.

And they will _never_ again lead humans back to a nest where their family waits.

Even curled up and hidden against the heart-fire warmth of Toothless’ scales, Hiccup bristles at the memory of being _seen_ , of _meaning_ to be seen. There was poison in the movements and signals of the _pfikingr_ , a wanting-to-hurt, and a wrongness in his voice as he yowled in the meaningless way that _pfikingr_ speak to dragons when they do not want to be understood, when they are not even _trying_.

But it was not as terrible as the _wrongness_ of the Knotted Man who was, and the Knotted Man is not anymore, so instead the young dragon had hissed all the fear splashing inside him at the man and did not stay still to let him pounce.

No more ice falls striking from above, and the iceberg does not moan in the pain from its burns again, so carefully, Toothless rises to all his paws, and Hiccup sits up with him. They trill and whimper and croon soft sounds to each other, checking _you safe yes hurt? hurt? good yes worry worry careful fear fear you here here here you me us good_.

Hiccup twists to nose at one shoulder, flinching as he nudges a point that will be mottled and dark and painful beneath his scales soon. The movement leaps through both of them, and Toothless startles with him, whining _hurt!_

It does not disturb either of them that Toothless should whimper for Hiccup’s pain. They are so attuned to each other that Toothless’ shoulder hurts in sympathy, a fainter but really-true echo of the bruise blooming across his _heart-beloved_ ’s paler skin.

The runaways tumble around Toothless’ paws, chirruping _excitement_ and _look!_ and _curious_ and _amazement_ as they swat at the fallen-away pieces of ice and twist around their own tails to see the ways the ice has changed.

Toothless growls at them, frustrated. If they were themselves alone _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ would already be away, but the hatchlings will not follow!

They are too small still, Hiccup knows, nudging his nose against Toothless’ scales and petting _calm easy peace no-fight not-important us together yes good love-you_ with his paws. For Toothless, he manages a small and broken-stuttering purr. The hatchlings do not see signals that say _together_ and _follow_ and _this-way;_ they do not listen. It is not in them yet to follow neatly.

Hiccup does not consciously recognize the miniscule signals that let dragons fly together as a swarming flock, dodging and diving and soaring around each other in a shifting cloud, as signals. He could not think how to say them. But his body knows how to speak. His instincts know how to listen. It is a thing of dragons, to know how to fly together.

The hatchlings would fly tumbling and veering and crashing, and they would think it a very great game, Hiccup knows. And it is a great game, but now is for running and hiding and escaping, and not for playing.

_No_ , he says in touch, shifting his weight away from the exploring hatchlings when Toothless would have turned and snapped at them.

Toothless looks over his shoulder reproachfully. _Silly!_ he protests, huffing. _Danger here us go yes-urgent us go now us fly now frightened!_

Hiccup closes his eyes at him in a slow, affectionate blink. _Proud,_ he says, raising his shoulders and lifting his jaw. _You love-you proud triumph brave good_. He yowls a _traps_ warning, and the exultant whistling cry that means _free go fly-away free-to-fly_ , and mimics the sound of Toothless’ blasting fire. _Good good good_ , he praises Toothless for letting the lightning-fierce dragon loose, for burning away the things that bind noses and jaws so that dragons cannot bite or flame or spit or roar.

Somewhere inside him there is wailing and hiding and fear and shaking that rattles fangs and does not _stop_ , like being too cold to know what warmth is, when the warmth of safe-warm heart-fires burns as if enemies had turned their fires against him. Somewhere inside there are memories inside of _home-_ ice shattering and screaming, of the ground shaking beneath their paws, of everything that is safe and home and loved torn into and bleeding, violated and vulnerable.

He shoves these things away and buries them like mess and turns his tail to them, knowing that now is not good for being afraid.

Far away, echoing through the cracks and broken places, there is a cry thick with _frustration_ , and all the hatchlings startle and leap and run back to _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ , chirping and pressing themselves against his sides, _promising_ to stay close.

Hiccup checks for them all in a glance. There is the fire-skin hatchling who led them and is Ringleader, and the Grass Shadows fire-spinning one who is her friend. There is the rock-skin Loyal little dragon and the blue-spikes cousin he protects who Flutters and follows him. He can hold the idea of _pair_ and _pair_ in his jaws more easily than the _many_ of them all.

To Toothless, he signals _c’mon_ , and they slink out of their hiding place. They step carefully, looking for the way out into the sky again. Ice that was thin and waving as grass lies shattered on the ground like snow, and ice that was fangs is broken and only tree stumps now. It is not smooth and fragile and strange anymore. Now it is more like an island shore when storm waves have played with the boulders and tossed them around like toys until they break and be small sharp-biting stones.

_Uncertain_ , Toothless whines, ear-flaps going back at the new shapes of the ice. _Don’t-like_.

Together they leaped and padded and flew through many passages through the ice, searching and watchful always for the _pfikingr_ that were in the ice too. And now all of the scents and shapes and the sounds of the shapes have changed as the ice shakes against the lightning in its heart.

A human would be afraid, lost in the near-darkness, surrounded by strange forms and unstable surfaces.

But Hiccup is a dragon, and he can do things that humans cannot.

One of these things is knowing where he is.

His mother taught him to draw long ago. Seeing the world from above, dragon that he is, it was an easy pounce to drawing the shapes of ways to go and places that are, and to holding those shapes inside his skull to remember. His caves and his sky, both equally his home, are places of ups and downs as much as turns and glides. When he made his wings and learned to fly on his own, he learned to remember where the currents in the air were – the updrafts, the thermals, the strong gusts, the doldrums and dead spots – even when he could not see them.

Inside the ice is no different from inside the sky that way. It has ups and downs and wanderings and veers and spirals and stops, and is of remembering and knowing as much sight.

_This way,_ he gestures to Toothless, pointing to another tunnel. The low spaces and narrow passages of the hidden places of the wailing iceberg are making him nervous. As they retrace their pawsteps with the hatchlings scuttling at their tail, the distant crashes and screams and strikes of the trapped lightning-fierce dragon echo through the ice, and the iceberg roars and moans in _protest_ and pain.

_Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ have fled too many avalanches – blinding and devouring and destroying – to be comfortable with shifting ice, and here they cannot fly away quickly. There is nowhere to fly.

If the iceberg bites them, they will be trapped more tightly than in any human biting metal jaws.

So they coil around ice fangs and leap to the backs of stones and crawl low and creeping and slide carefully down slopes so that Toothless must turn and dig in his claws and climb down backwards and blind. He does not like to do so, but his Hiccup- _self_ watches for him. Still, he bristles and shakes himself, snorting _don’t-like!_ as Hiccup purrs to him and the hatchlings tumble down chattering _laughter-laughter-laughter fast fast fast falling!_

Only Toothless’ broad tail-fins stop Grass Shadows from skidding into the open space beyond. It is more than large enough to fly in, and a ledge on this side falls away into deep blue vanishing far below and rears up empty and gaping high above. But the air is still and slow, and there is no open sky to be found there. When they whistled at it in their searching, it answered _empty_. On the other side of the crevasse is a gap that leads into a wide tunnel.

There were human tracks in the wide tunnel before, but even humans would be better than being swallowed for always by ice.

Still, it is an open space, and when the little flock makes its way out onto the broad ledge looking out over it, Hiccup raises his jaw and closes his eyes, turning his face up to it as if it were the sun. The hood of his scale-skins falls back and away, letting the cold of the iceberg nip at his skin, and his shoulders heave in a chirruping sigh that says _relief open nervous scared trapped no-trapped no-more enough nervous very-much-so._ Beneath his paws, Toothless clicks and rumbles and croons _careful together us together yes good protect careful careful nervous alert_ in reply.

_There?_ Ringleader asks, whistling _nervous_ and looking at the tunnel beyond the crevasse.

_You fly_ , Hiccup gestures to her, imitating her flight with one paw even as Toothless spreads his wings in agreement.

An echoing scream howls through the chamber, and lightning blazes up from the crevasse, and the lightning-fierce dragon hurtles from the dark depths, twisting and roaring and thrashing.

From Toothless’ shoulders, Hiccup freezes, watching it carefully, curious and wondering and wary, tense with _uncertainty_ and with _maybe-fear_.

It is almost as dark as they are, but with more color to its scales and lighter on its belly. It does not have front paws, only wings, but many of their dragon-cousins are like that. It has spikes all around its head and lightning dances between them, and along the tips of its wings, and across its claws, and coiling around its tail. It hides beneath its own light.

Every dragon speaks with its own signals, but _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ do not need to know this one well to understand it.

It screams _rage_ and _frustration_ and _trapped_ and _hurting_. It lashes out at the ice all around, and when shards of it burst and fall, the lightning-fierce one flinches away.

There is a deep fresh cut over one eye, Hiccup sees, and that eye is all but closed. But he cannot reach out to it and pet and soothe and command _still!_ The lightning-fierce dragon is too angry at all things.

The hatchlings wail and shrink away, and the strange dragon whips around, its good eye fixed on the movement. It howls _threat!_

_Defiance!_ Toothless roars back. His body fights to leap away, or to rear and spread his wings and claw at the air and scream _challenge_ , but the little ones crowded around his belly hold him back. _No! you no! I fight!_

In the movements of his body and in fierce growls and chattering fangs, his signals say _bad bad bad dislike danger threat wrong scared rival-threat challenge go-away go-away wrong bad bad chase me scared chase fight yes yes yes!_

Hiccup trills _confusion_ , beneath it all, not understanding, but flinching away from the threat of lightning they cannot fly away from. Lightning is a _strange_ thing and he does not understand it. Lightning bites very quick and burns very fierce.

_Threat!_ Toothless snarls. _Wrong!_ His claws dig at the ice, tearing it up, and his fangs are bared and ready to snap. Fire burns in his throat, bright and constant.

Above, the lightning-fierce dragon hurls itself against the ice, but it cannot shoulder the ice aside. The nets across its head are torn away, but the chain still wrapped around its back paw rattles against the ice, catching in cracks and pulling the dragon from its flight. Howling _frustration_ , it folds its wings and falls.

When it lands on their ledge, it uncoils from its crouch and hisses _threat_.

Hiccup whines, protesting, as Toothless drops a shoulder to signal _down_ even as the black dragon braces ready to fight. But he trusts Toothless, and untangles himself from the flying-with, keeping close to Toothless’ side and in his shadow.

_You guard,_ Toothless says with only a glance, eyes flicking from Hiccup to the tangle of hatchlings all trying to hide behind each other.

He does not like it _at all at all at all_ , but he understands. Toothless cannot fight something attacking them _and_ protect the little ones, but they are two-who-are-one and _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ can do both.

_You you you you come here you come NOW follow quick careful you here_ , Hiccup gestures to the hatchlings, creeping back towards the slope and the scattered, broken ice.

As the lightning fades and flickers out, the lightning-fierce dragon spreads its wings and stalks across the ledge, glaring at Toothless. It bares its teeth, all its signals saying _aggression_ and _enemy!_

The two dragons snap and snarl at each other. The stranger lunges at Toothless, and the black dragon roars at it until it retreats. He spreads his wings to be bigger and his tail whips ready to strike. _Protecting!_ he growls. _Mine! Go-away! I protect! I fierce!_

Among the ice, the hatchlings hide close against Hiccup’s sides as he whines _anxious_ at their fighting. Flutters nips at his paw, catching it in her jaws and tugging at it, when he ignores her pleading to be petted. But he snatches it away and digs his claws into the snow. _No no,_ he thinks aloud, a lifelong habit. _No no no no-fight danger here ice no-fight us go Toothless-beloved scared away us urgent-important fly-away!_

They should not be fighting! They should be escaping!

The stranger tries to circle and prowl around, fangs bared and lightning snapping, but Toothless holds his ground between the terrifying trapped-and-raging lightning and the hatchlings and his _heart-mine_ guarding them _._ He claws at the air between them and howls _denial_ and _fierce_ and _mine_ even as his body tries to crouch _fear_. But neither dragon will back down, and Hiccup cannot bear it.

_Enough!_ Hiccup roars, a sound to stop a game or turn aside a reaching paw or chase away a pestering flock-mate. To the wide-eyed hatchlings, silent with mingled terror and wonder, he snarls _stay!_ fierce and _sure_ enough that they go still all over as if stung unmoving. Leaping from his perch, Hiccup races to Toothless’ side, half-running, half-stumbling, graceless but quick.

Toothless’ jaws are open, showing fangs and fire, but Hiccup does not hesitate to shove his smaller shoulder against his partner’s, nor to leap in front of those jaws and rear to his full height, raising his claws and meeting the stranger’s golden eyes, one bright and one hurting, with his own. He knows as sure as falling, as sure as sunlight, as sure as air, that Toothless will not hurt him.

It is an unthinkable thing – not just a _wrong_ thing, but a thing that _cannot be thought_. The thought is a shape that cannot be picked up and chewed into small pieces to taste and understand. Hiccup can no more put together the thought _Toothless will hurt me_ than he can swallow the sea.

_Enough_ , he says more quietly, lowering one paw to rest on Toothless’ nose. _Down_.

Toothless cries _no unsure fear you careful no here danger!_ low in his throat.

The lightning-fierce dragon recoils, just a step, pulling away as it tries to understand, and Hiccup looks away from it into green eyes filled with _love love love fear-for-you_.

_Calm-quiet-reassurance_ , Hiccup answers, running the back of his paw up and down between Toothless’ eyes in an affectionate caress. His soft cry, a cautious questioning sound, asks, _Trust?_

His Toothless-half shoves at him gently, crowding close. But he bows his head beneath his beloved-one’s touch even as he looks past Hiccup, watching the lightning-fierce dragon. _You yes always yes love-you trust-you fear-for-you danger careful love-you…_

Setting his shoulders, Hiccup turns back to the lightning-fierce dragon where it crouches, coiling and snarling, ready to strike. Sparks burst against its scales in bright flashes, and it has many fangs all bared.

It stares at him, and there is hatred in its eyes.

Hiccup cannot understand that – he has done nothing to this dragon. _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ have only snarled at it a bit. _They_ did not strike ice to make it tremble and fall and wound, or throw nets and chains.

And then he remembers the feeling of the hood of his scale-skins falling back from his face, and he remembers that he is standing as humans do even though he has his scales and his claws are sharp. He struggles to put those things together and understand how the strange dragon might see him.

At once he wants to slink away and hide and wail in darkness where _no one_ can see him, to cover his face and his fur beneath the scales that he should have, look away and not see _confusion-hatred-recognition-enemy-threat_ in dragon eyes.

But he cannot signal to a dragon he does not know with the hood hiding his eyes. When he tries to wear it and speak to even his flock-kin who know him well, they catch him and nudge him and tug at it with claws and jaws until they can see his face and his eyes again. Light On Water traps him with the many coils of her tail and licks at him, insisting on grooming _fur_ and not scales. It is strange-different for dragons to have fur, but his family is used to him as he is. His signals are muted and muffled and confused when he is hidden away.

At his back he can sense Toothless rumbling in anger and protectiveness, and if he steps away then Toothless will leap at the stranger who was trapped in ice, and they will fight, and they should not. There is nothing here to fight over except escape, and they will not find the sky by fighting!

Toothless is _very very very_ brave, but the lightning-fierce dragon is very angry and very frightening, and Hiccup is afraid for him. And to protect Toothless from harm, Hiccup will do _anything._ He would die, if to die was a needful thing. Without Toothless, he could not be. He knows this for sure now.

He knows the taste of _alone_ that is _want-to-die_.

And he knows what he is.

So he faces the lightning-fierce stranger with his face bare, and _believes_.

_No-fight!_ Hiccup snarls, swiping at the stranger with his claws splayed out and then turning his shoulder to it, huffing as if it is _very_ boring, to fight.

_tt-th-ss,_ he rattles the sounds that mean the one he loves most in all the world, for all their life, _this-one-here_ _no-fight down no-threat back-away calm peace no-fight._

Every movement complaining _reluctance,_ Toothless steps away just a little bit. He does not hide his fangs, but he shows them less, and his growls are _unhappy_ and not as much _raging._

Hiccup blinks _gratitude love-you always always always_ at him.

But, _you_ , Hiccup gestures, and pretends to be the lightning-fierce one, spreading his own wings and stalking and turning his head as it does, hissing and clicking in imitation of lightning. _Enough! You threat curious wondering cautious? Us fight!_

He meets its eyes, glaring _challenge fierce strong not-afraid confident_ , and then looks away, _don’t-want_ and _no-threat_. But he watches it out of the corner of his eyes, not letting it disappear under his nose.

_Us_ , he retreats to join Toothless, linking them with touch, _us go flying go us out-away far no-threat!_

They only want to leave.

Sparks crawl across the stranger-dragon’s scales, and Hiccup sets himself between the lightning-fierce cousin and Toothless- _heart-of-mine_ again. It rumbles and hisses and glares, rolling its one good eye to look at the little dragon all over.

Quietly, Toothless steps into his own pawprints, resting his nose between Hiccup’s shoulders, nudging at the new fins to be more like Toothless- _self_.

_Mine beloved mine_ , says Toothless, low and all but silent.

_You,_ the lightning-fierce one growls at last, lowering its head to look at Hiccup at his own height, and roars _danger-enemy-human!_

Hiccup does not hesitate. Even as fangs flash in the light from new sparks, he pounces forward where it cannot see him, where it must trust his scent and his sounds and his touch. He sets his claws on the lightning-cousin’s nose for only a blink, and roars denial, refusal, conviction. _Dragon!_

All his faith, and all his confidence, pour themselves into the sound like ice melt bursting its banks and washing all the debris of a long winter out to the sea and gone. He is half of _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ , and they face down Alphas and _win_! They are leaders _themselves_ , not Alphas maybe, but beloved and trusted by the greatest of kings.

He will _not_ be intimidated by one who knows him not at all.

At once it leaps away, and Hiccup lets it go, lifting his claws so that they do not tear into a nose as soft as Toothless’. The chain around its back paw jangles roughly as it alights on an outcropping of ice and half-hidden stone.

From there, it pants and ruffles its wings and crouches and stares at _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ as they twine together again and at the hatchlings peeking out with big eyes from behind their hiding place.

Toothless pushes his beloved-one over, making soft grunts and croons of relief and affection, and Hiccup pets at him before rolling to crouch on his haunches and whistle for attention.

_That?_ he points, when Lightning-Fierce looks at him.

It shifts its leg, and the chain rattles.

_Me,_ Hiccup offers, sidling out from Toothless’ shadow again. He stretches out his clever paws to be seen, snapping at the twinge of _fear-shame_ that tries to crawl from its cave and bite him. They are claws still. They are as they should be.

Slowly, pawstep by pawstep, Hiccup edges towards Lightning-Fierce, looking up with every movement and watching its jaws carefully for sparks and snarls. Lightning is faster than dragons, even Toothless- _love_.

But its sparks are fading and tired and go out before they have gone even a little way along its jaws.

At the base of the stone, he settles and waits. The ice is cold against his scales, but he will go no closer, without permission.

He waits long enough for Loyal to grow restless and rumble a question, quickly scolded to _hush!_ by Toothless. But at once the quiet, desperate whimpers that Toothless is making – they tear at Hiccup deep inside, but he _must_ try – start again, broken only for a moment.

Then he hears the sound of wide wings spreading, and Lightning-Fierce leaps from its stone and lands close beside him, shuffling nearer in wary movements.

_Good good good you safe gratitude careful safe you good happy me_ , Hiccup trills, reaching out and tapping curiously at the chain. He is aware of the long claws only a breath from his throat and underbelly, and the burning-blazing scent of faded-away sparks. But he cannot watch the dragon _and_ the trap.

Toothless will watch; they are two-who-are-one and have two sets of eyes.

It is not at all a tangled-up and small-pieces and sharp-edges trap. It is only a push-and-hook sort of clasp. Hiccup has a pair just like it, but smaller, that he has used in some of the flying-with harnesses he and Toothless- _beloved_ have made, when there are binding straps on it.

As soon as the chain falls away, Lightning-Fierce tenses and leaps, beating its wings hard enough to scatter snow and tumble Hiccup into a drift of it. He pulls himself out of it sputtering but purring.

Toothless promptly knocks him back into it, unable to stop as his paws slide across the ice, bowling his beloved-companion over in delight.

By the time they have purred and chattered and trilled and petted and comforted each other, Lightning-Fierce has disappeared again into the tunnels of the iceberg.

And then, of course, all the hatchlings jump on Hiccup too.

He pushes them away chuckling in the manner of dragons, and leaps easily back to Toothless’ shoulders. _C’mon!_ he gestures to them, and Toothless points his nose to the tunnel beyond the crevasse again.

It is good to fly again even for not much more than a leap, and _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ could fly even in the tunnel if they were alone, but the hatchlings swarm about them like happy bees, shrieking and chittering and whistling _fast fast fast us go yes excited flying hurry-hurry excited can’t-catch-us fast happy like us like flying together!_ So Toothless runs, turning and climbing as Hiccup guides him with touches against his sides and his shoulders.

Now they do not need to crawl careful with bellies low and heads down and shoulders drawn in tight through small spaces, and soon Toothless raises his nose and chirrups _sky!_

He can smell open air.

But even as he does, he rumbles _uneasy_ , and he growls low in his chest, and his paws slow from their racing towards the brightness close now.

Hiccup’s nose does not hunt scents as well, but the smallest breath of distant wind ventures down into the ice, and he too smells _fire_.

Toothless’ growls become a snarl as they come at last into a wide-open cave, the throat of the tunnel becoming a gaping mouth that had fangs once – they are shattered and broken now with shivering – and the open sky beyond. Outside there are flat places and paths to follow and spires to perch on, and the sides of the iceberg falling away into the sea.

But beyond the mouth of the cave there are the human ships they saw before, and waiting within the cave there are _pfikingr_.

They hold sharp things ready to strike with, tall branches with wicked curved claws at their tips, and long-claw blades, and broad chopping blades, and heavy-striking things, and biting arrows. They have nets all of metal, and they have chains. Tame fires burn at their feet and all around as they wait in ambush, and their signals say _ready_ and _angry_ and _watchful_ and most of all _scared_.

Before them their Alpha paces, yowling at his followers and clawing at himself and shouting even at the ice above him and his own paws. The movements of his body scream _furious_ and the chopping blade in his paw claws _want-to-hurt!_

He shouts at the humans, and not yet at the small dragon-flock hesitating at the back of the cave.

But his _pfikingr_ see and they stare, and their signals say _afraid_ even more so, and the Shouting Man turns to see what has frightened them.

Hiccup recognizes his reaction as The Thing That Humans Do. The Thing That Humans Do is to see Toothless- _beloved-one_ , and to stare with hunger-to-have as if Toothless were a most delicious fish or the best of all toys. It is for human paws to reach forward to snatch, and at the same time for human bodies to pull away frightened and cowering. It is for eyes to go very wide, and for jaws to drop as if to gulp and swallow.

The Thing That Humans Do unsettles him; it is a backing-away careful thing and a _threatening_ thing mixed all together and strange. Toothless- _heart_ is not to snatch at and not to eat!

The voice of the Shouting Man whines in _surprise_ and _amazement_ and with _wanting_ as he shouts many _pfikingr_ sounds that Hiccup does not understand, but in among them the Shouting Man makes the noise that Hiccup has begun to distinguish as the human sound for _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_.

Hiccup thinks it quite right that humans should use the sound _fuh-ree_ for them. He knows that sound because _Uh strrrrTT_ made it for him, on a best-of-all day when a very good trick worked very well, and of course they are _fuh-ree_. But it annoys him that humans should follow that sound with trying to trap them in nets.

Humans make no sense.

_Dragons_ would never confuse the sound that means _free_ with an attack to catch.

Still, he flinches away, reluctant still to have _human_ eyes on them. His instincts are to hide, to not be _seen_ , to turn and to run.

But the sky is just beyond.

But the humans have tangle-nets, and the hatchlings swarming about, whimpering _uncertain_ and _fear_ and then snarling small threats, are too small to fight.

Toothless rumbles a question, sensing his partner’s anxiety and sharing it. His shoulders draw in tight and his wings spread, ready to leap, ready to flee, and his tail lashes. His claws tear at the trodden-down snow beneath them as the eyes of the Shouting Man flick over them, from Toothless crouched tense and defensive, to the hatchlings wavering in the air. Ringleader wraps herself around a fang of ice and clings to it, digging in her claws even as it shudders, even as all the ice shudders.

But the eyes of the Shouting Man do not fix on the young dragon crouched low to Toothless’ shoulders. With a _very_ great effort, as he scrabbles at the high sheer walls of panic-fear to climb to a place where there is open air and thinking, Hiccup understands that the _pfikingr_ does not see him. His scales are as dark as Toothless’ – they were Toothless’ scales once, until Toothless shed them and did not need them anymore – and his fins are the same, and in the glancing light of sky beyond and flickering fires, the _pfikingr_ sees them as the single self they know they are.

The thought burns through his own small heart-fires, and he warms himself against it even as the Shouting Man turns a bit to scream at his _pfikingr_ followers, lifting his chopping blade and gesturing in ways that might mean _follow_ to them. But the _pfikingr_ pull away and their paws shake and their staring is _want-to-run_ and not _want-to-fight_.

This makes the Shouting Man _very_ angry.

_No_ , Hiccup growls, curling his claws across Toothless’ shoulders, and through touch he says to his other half _determination,_ that they will _not_ turn and run, they will not be afraid. They will not brush so close to escape, and then veer away as if from waving wings that startle.

When they were smaller, _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ would have fled whimpering and howling from human eyes always. They have learned more of humans since then.

Inside they still wear bright scars from the Knotted Man, who tore them apart and shattered them and broke them until they were small and hurting and cast aside. But this Shouting Man is not so terrible, and they do not have to be afraid.

Together they choose _daring,_ and _brave_.

All this they say to each other and understand even as the Shouting Man turns away from his humans with _annoyed-angry-frustrated-giving-up_ for them and _ready-to-fight_ for _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_.

So they can stand unflinching, together. They can stare down the _pfikingr_ who stand in their way, and they can prepare to leap and pounce if the Shouting Man does not stand aside.

They will not be trapped here, _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ choose, and they will not cower and slink away.

Instead Toothless shows his fangs and roars _go-away us fierce danger us fight threat go-away you here not-afraid!_ as Hiccup screams their triumph of _fearless together flying yes free-to-fly free yes us protect_ , and behind and all around them the hatchlings puff out their chests and spit small fires and make small roars of their own.

And far away and deep below there is another sound, but louder and louder beneath the sound of their _challenge_.

The Shouting Man screams back at them, but Hiccup is not listening. He can understand humans sometimes if he tries _very_ hard and if they try too, but he does not care to do so now.

When he glances back into the tunnel at their tail, there are flashes of light within, and there is a terrible _screeeeeeeeeeeeeeee_ sound like metal scraping against ice.

_Down!_ Hiccup signals, pouncing at Toothless’ shoulders to push him and shrieking _danger-alert-scatter-NOW!_ to the hatchlings. He sees them dive away in all directions even as Toothless hits the ground unquestioningly, without hesitation, without doubt.

The passage explodes into brightness and the singing-inside-skulls feeling of lightning striking too close, and the deafening furious scream of Lightning-Fierce who has followed in their pawsteps soft and quiet and clever, tracking the strange-but-sure little dragon that had promised that he and his flock meant to escape from the ice and fly away.

_It_ wants only to escape, too.

Its wingtips tear against the sides of the tunnel and sparks fly from them as if lightning could be pulled from ice, and it hovers for only a moment over the dragon-pair flattened as small and not-in-the-way as possible against the ground.

Then it sees the humans gathered together ready to strike, guarding the way out.

Lightning-Fierce screams _joy_ and _rage_ and _excitement_ and _free_ even as the Shouting Man screams back at it, and fresh lightning roars from its jaws, lashing out at the Shouting Man and his chopping blade. It blasts at the _pfikingr_ with their nets, and lunges into the pack of them. Its wings knock away the claws of the long branches, and its lightning strikes away sharp splinters of ice that burst from the walls of the cave.

Lightning-Fierce fights wild and uncontrollable and snarling, and its cries are thick with _joy-at-fighting_ as much as _anger_ or _wanting-to-fly_.

It is _very_ bright, and even to Hiccup and Toothless, who like to fly in storms, it is too loud and too fierce to face. They turn their eyes away and watch only in glances as Lightning-Fierce takes their fight from them.

Very small so only Toothless knows, Hiccup shrugs in the way of dragons. It was not a thing he would wail and hiss and snarl to keep, that fight. The dragon-cousin can have it, if the fight is a joyful thing for it to have.

Toothless’ sides heave in a _hough_ that is laughing a bit.

Lightning-Fierce swats the last of the humans aside, and races for the mouth of the cave, and in an instant it is out and away.

Sitting up, Hiccup whistles sharply, calling the hatchlings to follow. The small ones race to their side crying _distress_ and _fear_ , and Toothless yips _hurry!_

Toothless does not leap into the air, knowing instinctively that the beating of his wings will knock the smaller dragons about if they try to fly too. Instead he runs, picking his way among stunned and whimpering humans and their sharp things fallen all around.

The Shouting Man sits up enough to stare at him still and to reach out a snatching paw.

Toothless snaps at the paw, and in the same movement Hiccup spins and lashes out, drawing his own small sharp-claw blade.

The Shouting Man draws his paw back untouched with a shrieking yelp, all his body startling so that all of him pulls away from the black dragon. His eyes track the flashing of the blade, and the paw wrapped around it.

Now he sees that Toothless is not alone, and his signals twitch with _shock_ that becomes _rage-confusion_ as he blinks and shakes his head and stares. Hiccup meets his eyes for only a moment, meeting that _rage_ with _defiance_ and baring his own fangs – they are _not_ afraid of _pfikingr_ always!

They are braver and stronger and smarter than that!

But the Shouting Man is reeling _stunned_ still, and humans do not taste good to bite. So when Toothless tenses to strike, Hiccup signals _no_ and _not-interested_ and _not-important_. He turns his shoulder to the Shouting Man and sheathes his sharp-claw blade again as Toothless thinks and moves and decides _no-fight_ with him.

And instead _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ race onward towards the sunlight and the sky.

The humans are forgotten as soon as the hatchlings take off into the open air, free of the iceberg at last, and _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ follow them, all of them flying up and up and up in a rejoicing, excited spiral.

It is best of _all_ to have sky all around again. Hiccup yowls _happy relief happy you me we us together safe happy love-you love-you brave yes us good fierce sky here now sky sky sky us flying up up up!_ and Toothless purrs _love-you always relief flying relief love love love_ back to him.

There are heavy clouds in the distance, and Hiccup can see a shadow in the sky fleeing to them, disappearing quick and silent. But Grass Shadows tumbles over and over in eager flips and rolls almost close enough to touch, trilling her delight at being out in the air again, and Ringleader pounces at his shoulders, wrapping her long body and her sharp claws around him and nuzzling at his face before taking off again.

When Flutters lands on his back between his wings, Toothless does not shrug her off, and she sidles forwards to nudge her heavy nose against Hiccup’s back, trilling. He twists to pet her and she sighs _relief_. Her Loyal rock-skin friend struggles to match their spiraling flight, and Toothless levels out and lets him catch up.

There is no need to cry _let’s-go!_ and at once Toothless veers away from the sharp peak of the iceberg, hunting for a good wind that will blow them far away and back to safer places.

* * *

They do not fly all the way home to the island of the gorges in a single soaring flight. The runaway hatchlings have flown very far already, and their wings are tired, and now that there is no more excitement and running, fear catches up to them and pounces on them and shakes them in its jaws. So for a time their little flock sets down on a very small iceberg, too small for caves.

The little ones would sleep, but whenever they curl up together and rest, the ice melts beneath them and they wake up splashing and surprised and upset. Instead they whistle and click and paw at each other, mimicking the sounds and the gestures of Lightning-Fierce and pretending to battle many humans, chirping with wonder and bristling still a bit in fear. They toy with it to make it a familiar thing, turning it over and over like a crab to learn the shape of it, and how it will bite and snap, and how it will scuttle away, and how it will only thrash helpless and harmless and with its soft underbelly turned up and easy to bite into.

Loyal sets his paws into the ground and snarls, pretending to be Toothless as Grass Shadows hovers above him, spitting small flashes of fire like sparks, and little Flutters stalks between them, scolding, to drive her away.

Hiccup watches Ringleader, keeping all his _amused_ signals muted – he has no wish to mock her – as she lowers her head to lap up the cold water that was her napping place and turns her tail to the story, her shoulders tight with _embarrassment_ and her tail-tip twitching in _irritation_. He knows that she is the leader of her friends – it is in all her movements and the way they look at her – and that flying away was her idea even if being lost was not.

She is not quite sorry, still, only a little subdued. And he cannot bring himself to scold her for running away and getting into trouble, although it is a _good_ joke, to give advice he would not himself follow.

At his side, Toothless grumbles and paws at one ear-flap. His tail lashes with _annoyance_ , and his wings rustle as he folds and spreads and folds them, fidgeting.

_Beloved-mine upset you why what why worried unhappy why you-dearest why?_ Hiccup chirrups to him, turning to nuzzle under his jaw, rolling onto his back beneath the dragon’s throat; it is an easier thing, now, with the new fins against his spine. Toothless shifts, curling his forepaws before him and cradling his other self’s smaller form. He knows ice is too cold for Hiccup because his heart-fires inside do not blaze as bright.

To be able to breathe those fires is an old dream, set aside reluctantly and chewed on sometimes hopefully as if it were a dry bone that might have some sweetness _somewhere_ within. But neither of them doubt that those fires are _there_.

Toothless bares his fangs – Hiccup can feel the _snap!_ of his fangs springing out, clicking through the bone of his jaw and his own skull – and growls _want-to-fight sullen storm-air-warning that-there don’t-like ready-to-fight snarling fierce yes me fight!_

They have not seen Lightning-Fierce since they flew away from the iceberg, but Toothless still wants to snap and snarl and leap at it. He complains _wrong smell wrong don’t-like stranger-intruder irritation wrong don’t-like_ , and he hunches his shoulders and sulks.

He does not have spines that spring out and push others away, or fins that ruffle and flare, or feathers to puff out like a swatted-at bird, but although his scales are smooth always it is _like_ that, in his body.

Hiccup catches at one ear-flap and tugs at it, careful of his claws, until Toothless must turn and look at him where he sprawls in the black dragon’s paws. _You good fierce yes brave fierce you_ , he reassures Toothless. _You safe happy happy love-you good-good-good dearest-one beloved-mine safe together no-fight not-important_. He flicks out one paw as if knocking aside something small and meaningless and forgotten as soon as it is not seen, dismissing it.

He is happier for Toothless _not_ to fight when there is no need, even if Toothless had wanted to fight it very much.

_Gratitude_ , he purrs.

Toothless looks at him _baffled_ and whistles _why?_

_You,_ Hiccup gestures, nudging his skull against Toothless’ nose. _Trust,_ he says, lifting his jaw and baring his throat.

His other half puzzles over this for a moment, and remembers. _Silly_ , Toothless snorts fondly, and licks at him until Hiccup yelps and squeaks and tries to struggle away, laughing. And even as Toothless chuckles at him mockingly, the black dragon thrums a _together-calm-happy-safe_ sound that is for times when they are curled up in their own nest drifting off to sleep, and means _always always always_.

* * *

At the foot of the cliff, far below, the sea flashes and laughs. Small bright glints spark from the distant waves and the flaming of the sun as it retreats from the stars sneaking out to chase it away. Behind the dragon-pair, there are the sounds of _all_ the dragons that should be here, crying out to each other as they fly and hunt and play and argue and sulk and complain and quarrel and make the island of the gorges their own.

The wind gathers itself, and spins around, and a breath of it roars down into the gorge to smash itself to pieces far away at the end of the canyon. Another gust of the sea wind coils around him, and Hiccup turns to meet it, breathing in the scent of the open sky and its promise of _flight_ , of islands they have not flown to yet, of dragons, of fires, of the wild living ocean.

There is some light left, and the updrafts at the end of the canyon still roar their challenge to the little dragon perched on the edge of the cliff, wings spread and stretching away the bruising ache of falling ice, ready to leap. Beside him, Toothless howls a warning to it, teasing more than snarling, calling _here-we-are_ and _ready!_

One more try, learning the new fins that are _better_ although the two of them were the same already, and then _Tt-(click)-th-phuh-ss_ will join their flock-mates in their new nests and curl up warm and together to sleep.

Or perhaps they will fly to chase down and catch the stars while others sleep, alone-together in the sky and wild and _fuh-ree_ that even _humans_ know they are.

Hiccup laughs in the way of dragons, and leaps with Toothless beside him, and they fly tumbling and spinning, weightless and fearless.

And on the wind, in the distance, there is the smell of storms…

* * *

_-end-_

_thanks for reading – Le’letha_


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